Wishing you a truly magnificent, magical start to 2014!
What are your dreams and aspirations for 2014?
What is your heart longing for?
As we enter 2014, here’s 4 Thoughts about how to get the New Year off to a Roaring Start.
1. Start from the Heart
It takes courage (which originates from coeur - French for heart) to stay tuned to ourselves and follow our hearts. There are so many endless distractions, obligations, pressures, enticements, commitments, chores and tasks to get caught up in. Staying tuned inside means turning down the astral radio that blares out conditioned notions of ‘what everyone else is doing/ thinking’ and getting on with what we need to be doing, thinking and feeling. Everyone has their own way of tuning in - whether its yoga, singing, meditating, walking, writing, painting, daydreaming, dancing, doodling, working out - the important thing is that it is authentic and helps us listen for our heart’s desire.
2. Think Big, Dream Big, Ask Big
My friend visionary leader Harun Rabbani, encourages people to discard ‘realistic thinking’ and to set outrageous goals. It works. I realise that I get small outcomes when I am thinking small. One of the quickest lure into thinking small is worry - particularly worry about money. Big dreams get us thinking bigger than worries - I never had the slightest idea how I would fund creating three albums - I just had a compelling dream to make music which propelled me into action. Big Dreams require making Big Asks. In 2012, I co-ordinated a big fundraising concert for Sing for Water - it had me asking for donations, asking for a venue, asking for singers, asking for support, asking for press attention. In my early life, from stories like Oliver Twist, I’d got the impression that asking for more was greedy. Acting on big dreams has taught me that asking opens doors. Firstly, because asking more of myself makes me raise my game. Secondly, asking others gives them an opportunity to contribute their creative expertise, support or skills and if they can’t help, they will usually direct you to somebody who can.
3. Take Daily Daring Actions
Any big dream starts out in the etheric realms of our imagination and inspiration. Grounding it takes innumerable thoughts, words and actions to bring in into reality. The Protestant Work Ethic that I inherited was helpful to a degree in enabling me to apply elbow grease to my To Do Lists. However what really helped was understanding that in the process of making my big dreams come true, I was actually being transformed. The next step, rather than being a box to tick off on an endless list, could be a new discovery, a moment of reckoning or a totally over the cliff moment of daring do. I have had to repeatedly summons up every last bit of courage to pick up the phone or press the send button or stand up to sing in front of hundreds of people. Recognising that I am being catalyzed turns every process into a creative adventure.
4. Stand Out
I’ve found that it really is no good monkeying about trying to fit in. In truth there is a place where you fit exactly and that is the very unique space that you are currently occupying - inside your skin. All your amazing qualities are currently parked up in your earthly life vehicle. Having established that, it is then pointless trying to conform to other people’s perceptions of life - because far from fitting in, there is no way you can actually fit in there. That spot, as Oscar Wilde pointed out, is already taken. The fear of ‘being different’ dissipates when we realise that everyone is different and that acknowledging, celebrating and getting really creative with that difference is the source of peace. It brings the peace of self-acceptance which promotes the acceptance of others. Expressing yourself truthfully is inevitably going to bring you into a fuller understanding of your difference which rather than creating isolation actually promotes more connection, empathy, compassion and understanding of others. We appreciate the uniqueness that each of us brings to life’s banquet. So whatever it is you do, do it as you.
If you’d like to give your self expression a rocket boost for the New Year, please do join me at Hear Me ROAR! - a wild vocal liberation workshop - on 19th January.
Wishing you a truly Roaring start to 2014
1. Tuning In - how can you tune up your tuning in - consider the wonderful creative practices that help you tune in - can you give yourself more?
2. Big - what’s your big dream for 2014 and what do you need to ask of yourself and others to do it?
3. Daring - what’s the first daring step that needs to be taken?
4. Stand Out - how can you express more of your uniqueness - what colours, textures, style, musical genres, sounds, scents - help you feel and express more of you?
Picture: Chagall - The Dream
