Get Your Hopes Up!

Each of us has that right, that possibility, to invent ourselves daily. If a person does not invent herself, she will be invented. So, to be bodacious enough to invent ourselves is wise.
-~Maya Angelou

As I write this article, I’m assuming that there is something in your heart that you’ve wanted to bring about in your life for quite some time. Maybe it is a personal aspiration or a professional one, or maybe it’s a combination of the two where you really desire to live differently and as a result, feel differently.

And this isn’t to say that things are horrible the way they are and they have to change it’s just to say that there could be more for you to be experiencing about your full potential that you may be holding off exploring and aren’t really sure why.

Well, the first thing to know is there is nothing wrong with feeling discontented. In fact, there is a Universal Law calledThe Law of Life where it’s natural to want to continually grow and evolve and realize your full potential. Again, this isn’t to say you’re working yourself into a frenzy of constant bar raising, yet just continually checking to see what your heart is calling you towards next.

Have you ever considered why is it that others can see for us what we can’t see for ourselves? Why is it that others can have a BIG Vision for us a Vision that when we hear it we blush and think:Who, little old’ me??

In a nutshell, it’s because those folks aren’t walking around with the self-defeating, emotional baggage that goes along with walking in your shoes, and having walked in your shoes all the years of your life. No one experienced what you have, or took on the meaning that certain experiences had for you and what you took them to mean about your capability and your overall worthiness to live-out your Best Life.

We all have emotional baggage, it’s the way we choose to deal with it that makes all the difference.

And dealing with it, with the appropriate tools and guidance is totally and utterly doable. What tends to be more challenging is helping someone ground themselves in the belief in new possibilities, new experiences, new potential that hasn’t been realized within.

Why? Because when you dwell in new possibilities, you have to get real comfortable with the unknown, the uncertain, and the potential for disappointment. You need to take some risks if you want the big payoff. You need to step beyond the limits of what you know’ in order to experience feelings that you desire to experience, yet may feel very foreign to you.

And payoff isn’t an ego-centric payoff. Payoff means being able to actually give yourself the permission to experience joy, inner peace, and the opportunity to finally embrace the Real You the you who is aching to be seen, aching to speak your Truth, and aching to make a difference in your life and the lives of others.

Yet, when you have a first commitment an underlying commitment that wins out beyond everything else which is to avoid pain, to avoid the potential for disappointment or getting hurt, then your heart-desires always lay dormant in the background, wondering if they’ll ever get to see the light of day.

First commitments are tricky because they are often (almost always) totally unconscious. Most of us don’t realize that when you are too busy trying not to get your hopes up, playing it safe’, shooting really low so as if not to get hurt, that that commitment will always win-out, even if your heart can see all the things you desire, it’s like sitting in a glass capsule wondering why you just don’t reach out and grasp them?

If you’ve ever felt this way, or may be feeling like it right now, know that you’re not alone but also know that you have the ability to change this with the appropriate digging. Digging down deep to say to yourself:If I say I want this, but I’m not going after it fully, then what is standing in my way? What am I more invested in or committed to than what I say I want?

Consider those questions and then consider this encouragement: Go ahead, get your hopes up, anything is possible. If it’s in your heart, and you consistently think about it’, then something there is meant to manifest for you you just need the courage to allow it to come to fruition.