Ten Steps for Creating Success Joyfully

Personal power and creativity, when balanced, generate tremendous energy! Success includes helping others, harnessing your own creative genius and living your life from a space of calm, personal power. These tips can help you find that walk of strength to bring forth your personal goals and dreams in a good way. In my work as an actress, on stage, film and tv, and in my years of work teaching acting classes of all levels, I've watched in amazement as the process of developing optimal performance in acting began to illuminate the process toward developing optimal performance in other areas of my life -- in all areas, in fact. I began to see that the qualities one needs to be a good actor were the same ones needed to succeed in any other endeavor, including spiritual awakening. One needs confidence, full knowledge of the role one is playing, and the ability to make it real for oneself and, therefore, real for the audience as well. (This is so like the process of awakening, to me. We at once realize we are spiritual beings having a physical experience, and not the other way around - as Wayne Dyer put it so well -- and in the next breath, realize that we agreed to see it through, to make it real) One must be flexible, imaginative and emotionally free of restrictions and blockage. One must be willing to dedicate the time and effort, to explore the script they've been given, work with the other characters on the stage and make their environment home. One of the best ways you can increase both your success-thinking and your creativity, is to take a good acting class. Preferrably one where there is improvisation included, which means that you work without a script - making it up as you go along. It's thrilling, scary and generates tremendous mental growth. Books have been written on the creative aspects of acting and I might write an article later on about that very subject but I only touch on it here, to let you know where some of these ideas have sprang from. Others have sprang from my spiritual path and may include ideas and concepts that are new to you. I encourage you to just try these ten things for a month and see how you feel at the end of the 30 days! 10 Spiritually Sound Ways to Boost Success and Creativity 1. Accept assistance. Get help with some of what you are trying to do, or be willing to let something go when you are overwhelmed. Conquer any fear of you may have of collaboration or asking for help. If you look closely at why you feel you have to do everything yourself, you'll find some kind of fear operating that is keeping beneficial help from reaching you. In fact, during this next 30 days make it a discipline to ask for help at least once a day. 2. Vision it in! Dedicate time daily, to visualizing what you wish to create, and spend time doing some kind of practice or review of what you have done. Commit to doing something every day, but do not set a rigid amount that must be done. One sentence, written well, makes for a more successful day than twenty pages written poorly. In other words, develop a healthy respect for the act of visualization and write it into your schedule as part of your work. 3. Seek non-human assistance. Ask for a totem animal, to help you manifest your dreams and to show you the best way to proceed. Make a list of the skills you need, and announce to Spirit that you would like a "power" animal to teach you. The animal may come in dreamtime or during your daily meditations. It may appear in your life. Personally, Spider is one of my most influential totems and appears a great deal when I am writing. If the concept of Totem, or Power Animals, is new to you, you might enjoy reading Animal Speak OR Animal Wise by Ted Andrews. It opened a wonderful new world of wisdom and non-linear thinking for me and it might do the same for you! You might also enjoy exploring the use of Totem Essences for stronger connection to non-human teachers in your environment and spiritual realms. 4. Avoid squandering energies. If you cannot focus on the chosen aspect, let it go and do something else. If blocked, let it go for a while and come back to it later. In the past, this has always been a very hard one for me. The more I wanted something to be working, or completed, the more driven I tended to be. However, years of operating that way have taught me that more productivity can be achieved by shifting attention away from the thing so desperately desired, when feeling urgent or driven. It balances the creative flow. Take a break when you least feel that you can afford to stop. 5. Release expectations. Understand that Spirit may have a way of bringing the whole thing together, which your personality self has never even considered. Don't tie the hands of your Higher Self, by insisting on a certain sequence of events. Trust that God will unfold the perfect result. If you can take the position of "interested observer" it will be easier to let God work in your life. Consider how it would be if you tried to fly an airplane from your seat in the middle. How clear would your vision of the entire sky be from that perspective. Better to trust the pilot. 6. Be willing to take it one step at a time. Get used to not being able to see the next step. It will be revealed when you have done the work needed in the present moment. Jumping ahead is one of the biggest energy drains I can imagine. It's a little like trying to go 100 miles an hour with your foot on the brake. All you'll do is make a stink and burn out your brake pads! 7. Practice good will gestures. Find someone to encourage, lift up, or support. In the reality of the feedback loop, you will receive what you give out, and the support will be there when you need it. You are familiar with the Random Acts of Kindness movement a while back and the more recent Pay It Forward phenomenon. Both are rekindlings of a much older tradition: Do unto others what you you would have them do unto you! These ideas keep reemerging because they represent higher truth! It's an amazing truth that what you do comes back to you, so do something nice for no reason every day for the next 30 days. 8. Use conscious speech! Watch how you speak out about what you want to create--choose your words and images carefully. Don't push and don't push your ideas on other people. Share only with those who will support, encourage, and gently challenge weak points, from a position of support. Your body hears every word you say about your health. Your mind hears every word you say about your abilities and skills. Further more, your cellular memory records everything you think about yourself, whether you speak it out or not. Instead of saying "I'm terrible at public speaking" try "In the past, I've tended to be challenged by public speaking but I am learning to be comfortable sharing my truth and awareness with others." Speaking in this way literally programs your mind to put your challenges where they belong -- in the past -- and to focus your thinking toward the future in a positive way. 9. Do something nourishing for yourself every day. Make a point of it. It doesn't have to be a big thing. A long hot bath is one of my favorite gifts I give myself. Affirm "I am deserving of receiving this vision into reality", to open your channels for receiving more goodness and success. When you stop punishing yourself for work not done or results not achieved, you begin to release the taskmaster that has kept you enslaved to linear time results and projection. Yes, those things are there but they are not the law. They are a guideline and guidelines change. Be willing to enjoy wherever you are, even if it is not where you think you should be or projected you would be by a particular moment in time. 10. End the day when the day ends. Maybe the most important tip of all - Let the day go at the end of the day, without judgment or negative self-talk. Thank yourself for doing your best with the time, release any unfinished business to God and ask for dreamtime teachings, healing and help as you drop away to sleep.