Dawn of a New Day and a New Year for a Purpose Driven Life
I love the morning especially the twilight time; that time just after dawn and before the first rays of the sun peek over the horizon. The day is full of promise, hope, and new beginnings. I love walk Mina during these early morning hours. House lights are off; their occupants are still asleep. The streets are quiet. The occasional car drives by. Another early riser makes his or her way to the streetcar or subway.
I find inspiration during this quiet time. Sparks of ideas, intentions or intuitions me arriving from I do not know where. After I have walked Mina, I sit at my desk with my coffee. Overlooking the street, I connect with myself and the sun rises over the treetops. This is my time. When I am at my best. When I have clarity. For over 30 years, my morning ritual has included journaling, dream work, meditation, and writing.
Mornings are a sensitive time. What happens during these precious moments affects our entire day? We all know if we have woken up with a nightmare or other disturbing dream, it can ruin our entire day. I know that if I don’t connect with myself during this time then the day will be off. I am not myself.
The New Year has this same feel. We are inspired by the opportunity to start anew. Each new year is full of promise and hopes. It makes sense why we make so many resolutions.
Morning Routines
Many people also take the morning very seriously. They know that their intentions and how they start their day – and every day – is a factor in their living a life on purpose.
While there is not an ideal morning routine for everyone, we can learn a lot from the morning routines of successful people. Learning what others do can inspire us to start our morning on the right foot. I was surprised to find how many people from all walks of life throughout history have had meaningful morning routines – Winston Churchill, Ernest Hemingway, Franz Kafka, Mark Twain, Benjamin Franklin, Barack Obama, and Deepak Chopra.
Will power is the strongest in the morning. Research supports the notion that starting the day from a position of strength is the best recipe for living a meaningful life . Of course, purpose and meaning are how you define it. What do you want to create for yourself? As the day goes on and fatigue sets in, then our will power and self control also wanes. It makes sense that we use our mornings wisely and consciously.
Here are some commonalities to morning routines that I found in my research:
- People wake up early after a good night sleep; often earlier than the rest of us.
- They take a part of the morning for themselves for meditation, reading, finding something inspirational to read or to reflect on.
- They reflect on gratitude and what they are grateful for.
- They exercise.
- They visualize and create their day by imaging what the day is going to look like and then set their priorities based on these intentions.
- They spend time connecting with the people who mean the most to them.
Gratitude is especially important in creating our day. How often do we focus and get fixated on what isn’t present rather than what is present in our lives. The practice of starting the day with a list of things that are going well or that are working sets a positive tone for the rest of the day.
Living life on purpose
We often hear the phrase “on purpose” and it is associated with hurt and anger like “you did this on purpose.”
What happens though if we reframe “doing something on purpose”. We say” Yes I did this on purpose” and not with the intention of doing harm or hurt but with the intention of living life on purpose. What would that look like and feel like?
Part of creating an empowering morning routine reflects an intention to living life on purpose and to create how we want to be through our day. This means being mindful of our intentions. It also implies that we know the purpose of our lives and so all of actions and behaviour are in alignment with that. This is an ideal. So much of our life is unconscious and ill-informed as we are governed by our complexes. I know that this is true for me – some of my actions and behaviour are unconscious and ill-advised. This is where I think integrity comes in.
Be, Do, Have
Coaches from all disciplines speak of the “Be Do Have” model of change. “Be Do Have” says that who we are being and how we want to be in the world directly influences our actions. Actions then turn into the outcomes that we desire. If the “be” and “do” parts are out of alignment, then we won’t get the outcomes we want.
In my opinion, this is where Jungian psychotherapy and the unconscious comes into play. Jung believed that we need to bring our darkness into light. The unconscious is autonomous and often manifests often against our conscious will. Hidden beliefs influence our thoughts. Thoughts translate into our emotions and how we are being in the world. When we can bring aspects of the unconscious to consciousness, we are able to tap into wonderful life energy that can give us more vital and present.
I understand from Jung that this is how the autonomous aspect of our complexes materialize. For example, something happens that hurts us or angers us when we are children. We don’t understand and can’t make sense of what happened. We have a lot of feelings about what happened. Instead of processing our feelings, our young mind translated this into a belief about ourselves, Beliefs then becomes a thought. Whenever we think this thought, it affects our emotions. There is an energetic field reflected from the complex that draws the world to it, and influences are actions which then, in turn, we get the results that we get that reinforces the belief.
In this way, Jung’s worldview is that there is an energetic exchange between our SOUL and the world around us. He wrote, “Unless you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate”. In another place, he said ‘ Unless you make an inner situation conscious, it appears outside as fate.
Emotions and Being
The being question opens up the reflection of “who am I being in this moment”. The definition of being in the dictionary refers to the nature or essence of a person; having one’s state, nature, quality, or role specified. This is a SOUL question. What is the energy that we are putting out into the environment? The key to the exploration lies within ourselves, our beliefs, our thoughts, and our emotional life.
This is a universal truth that spiritual teachers for a millennium have discovered for themselves and shared with their followers. Buddha said: “we are shaped by our thoughts: we become what we think.”
Our psychic system consists of thoughts, beliefs, and emotions and these comprise the totality of our being; that is our SOUL. Our SOUL is the animating energy that infuses and influences all that we are.
Questions for Reflection
In your journal or other contemplative space, reflect on the following questions.
- Are my belief systems and feelings in alignment with what I want out of life?
- Where am I grateful?
- What do I do when life shows up contrary to what I intend?
- Are there negative or positive things that show up in my life and how do they reflect my inner situation? What do I need to be conscious of?
Christina Becker
January 2019
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