Your Most Important Job

This is an excerpt from the second of three articles, to be published in Living.Well Magazine, featuring highlights of my recent interview with Anita Moorjani, best-selling author of Dying To Be Me: My Journey from Cancer to Near Death to True Healing. For the full article be sure to pick up the July issue of Living.Well Magazine! (www.LivingWellMagazine.net)

            How many times have you said to yourself, or been told by others, that you have to go after what you want, to pursue success and “make things happen” if you want a fulfilling life? This is a commonly held perspective in our goal-oriented culture that still prizes rugged individualism and a “pick-yourself-up-by-your-own-bootstraps” mentality. But what if there is a more elegant and harmonious way to manifests our desires and create lives we truly love? What if the whole idea of “making things happen” runs counter to the way our universe actually works? What if our lives are supposed to be filled with joy rather than struggle?

            Anita Moorjani believes we are meant to live joyful lives, an understanding she gained through her near death experience (NDE). The fact that so many of us are not living in joy doesn’t prove it isn’t possible or realistic; it simply reflects the all-too-common circumstance of our forgetting who we are – forgetting that we are magnificent beings who are deserving of good things coming to us.

            Which means that remembering who we are is central to living in joy.

This is how it “works.” Because we are living in an energy-based, interconnected universe, coming into inner alignment with who we really are creates shifts in the fabric of consciousness that generate reflective shifts in our outer world. (Did you get that?) Here is a perfect example of what I mean, which Anita told me about during our interview:

Some time after her NDE, when she was fully healed from cancer and beginning to share her story with the world via her blog, a group of skeptics began harshly criticizing her. They believed she was instilling false hope in people with cancer and wasn’t offering anything useful, since her experience wasn’t immediately replicable in a scientifically-controlled-experiment kind of way. At first she began defending her position, but quickly recognized that as a fear-based response pulling her into an old attack/defense dynamic that was leading nowhere. So she stepped back.

She stopped blogging for several months and used that time to go deeply within herself, to center again in her truth. And she came to the realization that, not only had her NDE been authentic to her and very real, her desire to share her story with others was just as real, and just as authentic: being the message - embodying the message - was being her authentic self.

            She referred to that realization as an awakening, and it arose from her intention to come into alignment with her inner truth. And it was just after the awakening that she was contacted by Hay House about the possibility of publishing her story as a book.  On her birthday, no less! 

            Prior to that time, she had begun writing a book and had been told by many people that there was already a glut of books in that genre, that she would need to find an agent and face an uphill climb to even be considered by a publisher. Anita had no idea how to do any of that. She told me she didn’t even try the struggling, fear-based way of “making that happen.” She trusted that if the world was ready for her message, the message would be delivered to the world.

            And through the process of going inward to resolve the doubt that was triggered by the skeptics, she gained newfound clarity that she had to do her part in order for the universe to respond. Her message could not be delivered to the world until she came into complete alignment with the truth that sharing the message was an embodiment of her authentic self. It was hers to do, because it flowed from who she was.

 In her book she describes the intricate, synchronistic details that led to Wayne Dyer finding her story and deciding it needed to be published. She said in our conversation that all of those synchronicities were happening as she was resolving her inner doubt. She stated emphatically that the outer experience of being contacted to publish her story was “truly, totally, 100%” a reflection of her inner work.

            Anita understands now that all of us have the same job: to align ourselves with our own truth. She spoke for each one of us when she told me, “When I realize who I am, then what is mine comes to me.” She explained that when we “go after” things, we’re hammering into our minds the false belief that we are not already worthy, that we have to work hard to get what we want because it’s “out there” and in pursuing it we can prove our worthiness to have it. Yet our worth is a given; it does not need to be proven. It simply is. And in this interconnected, vibrational universe, when our awareness is tuned into the vibration of “who I really am,” we’re already connected with “what I desire.” It isn’t separate from who we are, it’s an extension or expression of who we are.

            So the real art of manifesting our authentic desires, as Anita says so clearly in the book, is not to go after them, but instead to expand our consciousness to allow them into our experience. That expansion is a natural outgrowth of, first, centering in our truth, and then allowing ourselves to feel our connection with nature and All-That-Is, to sense ourselves as part of a much larger Whole that is continually unfolding and expanding. She told me that she takes time each day to get quiet, to go within and find that centered connection. In her words, “I feel I’m part of something much bigger, and my part in it counts, it matters.” (my emphasis)

            This is what I love about Anita’s message. It so deeply affirms what I have believed in my heart of heart for years, which has been the foundation of my coaching and teaching: that who we are matters, that what we love or long for is a natural extension of who we are in this physical realm, and that not only does honoring our authentic longings bring us fulfillment, it is our perfect way of serving the Whole. I could not imagine a more elegantly and beautifully designed system. When we love and honor our true selves, we love and serve others in a genuine and joyful way.

            So let’s follow Anita’s lead.  Set an intention to be true to your authentic self, and be open to exploring what that means…to you. Give yourself some quality time and space in which to center within yourself and feel your connection with the larger Whole. Be mindful of your feelings and what they reveal to you about what you truly like, and what you’re genuinely willing to do - or not do. Look for ways to honor and express your unique magnificence.

            Remember that you matter.

            And remember Anita’s experience. She literally healed herself of cancer in being aware of who she really is, and in continuing to go deeply within herself to find and live her truth, she transformed an experience of self-doubt into one of magnificent self-expression. In daring to honor herself, she has helped countless others through her book, her continuing generosity in sharing her message through multiple media, and indeed her very presence.

            Your presence is every bit as transformative. Just…be yourself.