The Truth About Your Power

What, life isn't supposed to suck. Get out of here. Life is supposed to be good for me? I don't think so. Truth? Did you know that you have the power to create your own reality? True? Did you know that you can live the life that you've always desired? Holy? That's right. And that's why we're here. Are you ready? Unless you're on Joy overload, you've come to the right place, it's time to get out of your own way and start creating more of what you want, and less of what you don't end up with the excuses. I'm your host, Jani Roberts. Let's do this.

Welcome back, everybody, I'm excited to be sharing a gift that I received from one of my mentors, someone that I read quite a bit, her name is Sarah Doering. And I wanted to share some a perspective, along with some of her perspective, in regard to power.

Power is something that we all struggle with. And through the work that we do here at EY, I have really come to understand the value of standing in my power, the value of using the power of my voice, my words, my energy. And this is something that we want to spread this, this belief and this lifestyle of standing in our truth in our power, this is key. And when we've been pounded down to the ground, over periods of time, in our life, it can be very hard to stand up and use our voice and speak our truth. I get it, I get it, particularly when we have people coming at us from all directions. And, and let's say for example, if we really love the people that are coming at us, if we respect them, if we feel as though okay, what they had to say matters, perhaps perhaps we haven't learned to stand in our power long enough to be clear that we can sift and sort through what people say to us without allowing it to affect our power. Because it's their perspective, that doesn't make it true. Right, absolutely doesn't make it true. But it could be true for them from where they're sitting. Again, their perspective. But so many times in life, we, we all take on other people's beliefs. So someone will tell us something about ourselves, knock our power legs right out from underneath us, and continue on our way. And we're just kind of left there in the dirt. Feeling abused, really feeling as though we've been just trotted on, you know, energetically and emotionally. And from that perspective, we want to be sure to listen, when people are sharing their perspective, we don't want to assume that just because we respect them, or their work, or what have you, or their role in our lives, that what they're saying is true for us, we can listen, we can listen intently, we can be present, we can be respectful of their feelings and their perspective. But we do not have to take that on. We absolutely do not. So this is important in the work that we do is it that can feel easier said than done. And when people are really coming at us, and we feel like we're starting to become defensive or starting to feel as though they're weakening our energy, kind of stealing our energy, stepping on our chi. So we want to be able to pause and reflect and know that this is simply their perspective. And it doesn't necessarily have to take power from us, unless we allow it to do that. We can choose whether we allow that to happen or whether we do not. And in all fairness to us. Sometimes this takes time. So first recognizing what's happening, hey, every time I were on that person, I walk away feeling kind of drained, or as though they just don't really get me. I'm feeling I always feel as though I'm being criticized or something of this nature. You follow me? So we want to be able to say whoa, to ourselves, they're going to think believe do what they think believe do and so are we we are going to choose something different. We're going to pause so that we can feel if it feels like truth, or if it feels like bullshit it, and we're going to call it as we see it. And we can do that with kindness and love. Absolutely. Certainly, if we do it that way, we're going to feel better about it. But the bottom line is, we are not here to be trotted on, we are not here to be taken advantage of, we are not here to be told what to do. We're here to discover, to search to sift, to sort to step into our power. And we may need to lose our power for periods of time in order to understand the value of it, how to manage it, what it means to us all of the above. Very important. So in this in this read that I was into recently, it talked about Buddha. And for the 45 years after his enlightenment, he wandered about the northern part of India teaching. And he spoke publicly a lot, right? And many, many times to, you know, 10s of 1000s of times. So this was something he was doing everyday all the time. But he wasn't teaching in order to argue, any type of theory, he was teaching, for one reason.

And that was to end the suffering, which he saw around him. Now, I really want you to think about this. Because sometimes when we hear a statement about that, we think about the physical and I'm not saying he wasn't talking about the physical, but I just want to take a moment here and address the suffering. Because I feel it's really important for us to understand that people are suffering. I know I'm suffering in certain ways. You are probably suffering, but when I'm talking about my suffering, I have what I need. I really do. I mean, are there things that I'd like to have? I'm sure there's something I could think of, right. But I'm not in a situation of dire straits of dire needs for things, you know, I have water, I have a roof over my head, I have some food in the fridge, I have all my basic needs met, and many people do not. But the emotional suffering that is going on for all of us the struggle with in is what I believe he's really referring to because we have all known people who didn't seem to have much in the way of things, if you will, and and these people are extraordinarily happy, and at peace in their lives. So the assumption underlying all his teachings is that we don't have to be the way that we are. That all the sorrow and the pain and the frustration and the grief and the anger and all of that is unnecessary, and it can be eliminated, we can call to cultivate a new way of living a new way of being. Remember, we are human beings, not human doings. So we want to be in the now want to enjoy the experience of being and not live our lives in constantly in those emotions that are uncomfortable.

He taught so that we may know the joy, the happiness, the peace, the appreciation that love and that these teachings are actually a training for us and for our spiritual way of life, for the way that we are meant to live. Again, some people are like, Oh, that's all woowoo you know, that's crap. And that, you know, from your perspective, that doesn't necessarily that doesn't have to make it real for me, you could believe that and you can live that truth for you. But I get to choose, which means we all get to choose, right, what we believe in what we don't believe. So, this means a way that is real and true, and benefits all of us. Now, in this moment, and in times to come in our future in the future of our family members and of all humanity. There are five qualities of the heart and mind which are known throughout the teachings of Buddha as the five spiritual powers. And they'd been called the Five priceless jewels, because when they were developed, the mind resisted the domination of the dark forces, you know the greed and the hate and delusion of everything. And when the mind is no longer bound by those energies, then hope peace, love understanding come Passion, all of that, all of that is limitless, is absolutely limitless. I've also heard the five powers called the controlling, controlling faculties, the controlling faculties. And when they are when we're in balance, right, when we, when we've got the balance going, then we're able to keep the mind in some state of control, right, balancing the thoughts, and managing the madness, if you will, and then able to generate the power that leads to the freedom that comes when we stop trying to control. So these five spiritual powers, our faith, and our belief, efforts, mindfulness, concentration, or focus, and wisdom.

Now, you may find that a little puzzling that those are the five powers, it depends probably on your spiritual background, or if you grew up in more of a traditional religious environment, it might be that, that kind of goes what faith, you know, faith or belief, right effort, mindfulness concentration, you might think of that as focus and wisdom.

Did they feel for you at home? In this list, we're going to talk a little bit more about them. But I, the first thing, I thought it was worse love. And that was that was like, almost like, wait a minute, if you forget something. And I felt these, but I was like, Huh, where's the love?

So let's talk a little bit about it. So the first one, your beliefs, okay? This is all about trust, and confidence in source, right, or the creator or God or whatever you want to call, whatever your choice of language is there. And this inspires tons of energy, right? This belief that, for example, I could say I truly believe that the universe has got my back and all as well, even when I'm in the middle of the shitstorm, right. And when this energy is strong, then the effort to be alert and present in the moment is easy, right? When I'm tapped into that mindfulness, being thoughtful, it, it really thrives and becomes more and more consistent,

continuous.

And the stronger, it gets this mindfulness, the more focused and steady our mind is, right? Our thoughts are, we are bouncing all over with so much contrast. And this focus or concentration then expands it grows. And we're able to focus more easily Hence, when we first start to meditate. And after we've been meditating for a decade, how much easier that form of concentration is.And when our concentration deepens, in that quiet mind, when we can really sit in that this is when the answers come, or the wisdom, the wisdom bubbles up, it emerges. And when you think about this, the wisdom is really coming from an emptiness because we've stopped our thoughts. We've slowed everything down with quieted the mind. We're totally present. And fam, we're in love. We are absolutely in love. Very, very interesting process. Now, in our teachings, when we're going through, and we're working in our journals, and we're working in our course, and we're trying to sift and sort and figure out, Okay, what's standing between me and my ability to use my voice? Why is it that every time that person attacks me, nothing will come out? I don't I don't want to defend myself. But I could certainly say, you know, I really appreciate that that's your perspective of who I am or what kind of work I do or fill in the blank. You know what I mean? I appreciate that, that your perspective, but that doesn't hold any truth for me.

So, thank you, but no, thank you. You know, and hey, if it's your boss, you know, choose your words carefully or just move on. But it's important, because you're not being aggressive, you're not pushing back. You're just allowing them to share their perspective with you. They're standing in their power. We hope it's none of our business if they are if they aren't, but we hope. And then we in turn standard Rs, and they're actually gifting us the opportunity to do that. They're actually saying, hey, here in universities, like, here you go, this is an easy one, start practicing. So even if it's a simple statement, like, I can appreciate your perspective, have a great day.

That's huge. That's absolutely huge. And the way that we feel after we're able to do that, we don't, we don't cower down, we don't like take it, right, and then get so angry. And, you know, I do believe that when we get so angry, we feel like we're so angry with them, we're actually so angry with ourselves, for not standing up for ourselves. But again, we don't have to defend ourselves, we just need to stand in our power and speak our truth. And give others the space to do that, as well. Honor that in them. Note, that does not include taking a lot of shit off of people absolutely does not. It just creates space for more perspective. So this powerful belief that we all carry with us. And if you're still really trying to tune in and tap into your beliefs, like you're not sure what they are, you know, in the course, we work diligently in the first course to identify our beliefs. And it does take some peeling back and some discovery work to figure that out. But it is invaluable. Because once we understand truly what our beliefs are, then we can look at the ones that serve us. Choose them if we desire to choose them, to continue to believe those and those that are no longer serving us, maybe we just picked them up kind of randomly even, or their their belief systems that that really belong to the person that we no longer are, or the person that we do not desire to be any longer, then we're able to release those and allow that new perspective to come forward. Cool, great. This is how we shift this is how we grow. This is how we change. This is how we find the love. This is how we find the peace. So experience life experience is huge. This is why we truly believe there are no mistakes. We're just sifting and sorting, we got to try things on, we got to figure things out in order to know what our truth is. So experience is so valuable. Even if you feel like your whole life has been a file experience. My assure you it is not been. There is power in your experiences, tons of it. And it's time to discover what there is to learn from it. And no longer push against it, try to push it down, push it away, push it behind you push it inside, however bury it, it's time to look at it.

Because this is something people can't give us. Only source can provide these experiences and only we can choose to experience them. Right we can say no. And when we're in those situations where we don't feel like we have a choice, those experiences are valuable. And always as we move through them, we learn. We learned so much. And we discover there was an opportunity there to say no there I could have that a different perspective here would have really helped me next time I've got this this is so valuable.

But this arises out of seeing and knowing for oneself, not through anybody else's eyes. This is where we can find the gratitude and we can we can feel the surge of desire to commit to our practice in this discovery process. So that we can live experiencing more of what we want, and less of what we don't. It's it's it's like the most natural way to self give. Really just to give ourselves what we need. Yeah, really important. Now, we each have our own story, right? Every One of us has one, we probably have more than one. And our beliefs are embedded in there. As a result of those stories, those are the experiences. So it's important to pay attention to what kind of stories you're telling about yourself. Sometimes I'll catch myself telling an old story, and I just want to like suck it back in. What am I talking about this crap for this is overdone, does not serve me don't need to talk about it. And I've caught myself and said, You know what? I know that sounds random. But can we change the subject, because I'm paying attention to how I feel. And this is not taking me in that good feeling place. So being connected to belief and being paying attention, and being in the now it's absolutely critical for this spiritual journey that we're on, we have to pay attention, we move into the energy and then right we move into the energy. And this is another one of the spiritual powers. So energy and effort are like, sisters, they're not quite the same energy comes first. Right? I feel this surge of energy, and then I'm going to channel the energy and effort, some of the time take the energy and, and put it to work for me. So I can really practice feeling energy, paying attention to how I feel, I'm in a energy of anger, I'm in a energy of frustration, I'm in an energy of depression, what am I going to do with it? Where am I going to put it, and this is, this is a practice. And that's why it takes effort, right? Because what we are doing is we are shifting our energy from where it is to where we'd like it to be. And it's a game that we play all day long. And we need to look at it was fun, but understand the power of it. Big time, big time power. So when we're putting a lot of energy into something that is not serving us, we start feeling crazy, we start getting angry. When we start putting energy into something we love that helps us to feel balanced and, and just relaxed. Hmm. Now I'm moving with the energy I'm not pushing against. This is the flow of energy we want to hang out in, right. And there's there's many levels of effort. I think we all dabble in all of them. I know when I was younger, I was a bit of a maniac. Because everything was very intense for me, I had to do everything at full throttle. And I was having a great time, don't get me wrong. But with hindsight, I can see how it allowed me to experience a lot of really, really cool things. But it also limited me because I wasn't as present as I could have been. That's okay, now I'm more present. That's okay. So see, I'm playing in this, I'm just playing in this, I'm being more mindful, another spiritual power, right, I'm just being more mindful of where I am. So in mindfulness, Mindfulness means I'm not going to forget to pay attention, I'm not going to forget to be aware of what is going on within me, around me. And this can be very subtle. But again, the more we practice, the easier it is to do this. And it really becomes effortless. Now, as we become more mindful, it is easier to focus. I know that makes sense. You've experienced this when you're in your zone. And if you'd like to, let's say you like to exercise, when you're in your zone, you're not thinking about anything, you're, you're sending your energy in one direction, and it feels so good. If exercise isn't your thing, use when you're drawing, if you're an artist, if you're a musician, whatever it is, when you're in your zone, and it's easy to get there. It's because you've been practicing getting there. So this is taking the whole of you and putting bringing this together. Absolutely. And again, this will arise naturally, because you are exerting the effort, the energy to be mindful, okay, it gives the power

provides the power to be extraordinarily effective.

And there you are. focused laser concentration and attention and things just boom, boom, boom, are moving. You get momentum going like I am in my group. That's what that's all about. And this is where you land. You land in your truth. You stand in your power, you can feel the wisdom beginning to arise within you. I am really wise I'm wise when I listen, I'm Why is when I stand in my truth and in my power, that I'm able to quiet my mind long enough to do that. This is an ongoing inspiration for the work of the other for the wisdom. I don't think of this knowledge, because I don't believe it can be learned from a book, I think of it is intuitive, that constant practice of paying attention, you have so much intuition. But if you don't practice using it, we can all tap into that you could become extraordinarily intuitive, and just kind of sidestep all kinds of things that you would prefer to sidestep in life. If you're working through these powers, this is the work this is the journey. No one came here to suffer. We just have to quiet our minds so that we can find our way. Stand in our power. And remember who we really are, and why we really came.

It's been awesome being with you as always warriors. I look forward to seeing you, hearing you talking to you through social media and just chatting up, stay close. Know that you are never alone. We are all in this together. And whatever you do, stand in your power. Talk to you next time. Peace.