It seems to be the permanent headline: Times are tough. UGH! What help is that?

Isn’t this constant focus on the negative just a way to get everyone on the same fear page? It’s as if someone is decreeing that we all experience the exact same reality.

No thank you. I’d like you to gently ignore that media-induced prodding. Don’t buy into the illusion that worrying is productive.

Worry is reactive. For the most part, worry only leads to more worry, fear and stress. It’s not conscious intention. No one says: “I really want to worry more because it makes me do such amazing things and produces such wonderful and satisfying results in my life.” You may feel busy, but worry won’t help you manifest your dreams and desires. In fact, it produces blocking energy.

I know this from experience. Recently, as enlightened as I try to be, I ran up against my own anxiety buttons getting pushed. They got pushed because as I was bombarded by bad news (my own fault for watching the news, listening to the radio reports, etc.). I didn’t realize how thoroughly saturated I was with the negativity. It affected how I viewed my business and affected my ability to manifest my goals in flow with Universal energy. Suddenly, I was very much in my own way!

All my focus was on “needing” my dream life mentoring business to unfold in very specific ways. And this just set me up for disappointment.

I was disappointed that I didn’t get X number of people to a personal growth workshop. I was disappointed that a business partner failed to support an endeavor exactly as I had hoped. I was disappointed that my revenues were lower than this time last year. Yet, I was making progress in my business. I had grown my business by 20% for goodness sakes. I was achieving goals I had set. I just wasn’t “feeling” successful and that was creating an unhappy reality.

After a couple of stressful weeks of working through this, I came to the following conclusions:

1. Expectations are vastly different from intentions. Expectations are narrowly focused. They are about neediness and leave no room for manifesting magic. On the other hand, when we clearly set intentions, we can then use our awareness to match our intentions with positive emotions that inspire hope-filled actions that lead to goal manifestation. That’s a beautiful dance.
2. It’s vital to be emotionally aware. Stay aware of where your thoughts are taking you. Are you going down an emotional dead-end road you’ve experienced before? Have you boxed yourself in with constricted no-win thinking? Has an emotional button gotten pushed? When we can see that our emotions really stem from the past or are being induced by outside world circumstances, we can choose to positively shift our thinking and perceptions in a fresh direction. What a relief!
3. Stay open about HOW you’ll ultimately reach your goals and dreams. Rather than expecting things to happen in a certain way, your will’s way, develop a sense of graciousness about what comes to pass as a result of your efforts. My expectations were robbing me of the joy I could be receiving from my business progress. I expected that if I did certain actions I would get certain results. Once I made a very conscious decision to accept everything that I experienced as a gift, I got a lot happier! And, no surprise, new business knocked at my door.
4. Love the process of manifestation. One of the Natural Laws of the Universe is the Law of Gender. Ideas and thoughts are energy and they will move into physical form or bring about results. We just don’t know exactly how long it will take. Some goals and desires get filled almost immediately. A wish to hear from a friend results in a phone call. Other goals and desires have a longer gestation or incubation period. Developing faith and patience keeps you unblocked energetically. Expectations most assuredly interrupt the gestation process.
5. We are each powerful creators. Just as I so effectively created my frustrated reality with my puny expectations, a more amazing reality was just an open-minded, open-hearted thought and realization away. Make it a game to become aware of all the gifts and helpful resources trying to get through to your conscious mind. And, lo and behold…Shangra La!

Dream Life Manifestation Mentor Melissa Wadsworth, along with energy healer Gloria Two-Feathers, will be exploring the 7 natural laws of the universe, along with the 7 levels of awareness and how our intuition faithfully points us in the right direction, during a full-day workshop called “Accessing Your Inner Decision Maker and Visionary on March 28 in Seattle. Click here for more information about this exciting day.