The Ideal and the Real

I want to use the pulpit today to talk about grounding manifestation in day to day life, something I've been working on a lot this year. Hopefully, some seeds of wisdom are starting to sprout as I spend more time in the Real World on its own terms, consciously embracing the discipline of manifesting in current time rather than focusing on a rosier future.

Out of this process, I've begun to see that the tension between the Real World and the one we intuit is possible -- the Ideal World -- actually serves evolution. When we know the full potential of someone or something, it can make us less fully satisfied with now. The ache that comes from this gap is God-in-motion, tugging, pulling, pushing, goading us to undertake the long, slow, hard-work of making this world better. Our vision of what-is-yet-to-be motivates us in the here-and-now. The gap helps us to evolve.

The problem arises in resistance. If we resist the pain or frustration born of the gap between Ideal and Real, we tend to multiply the pain and then to start making bad decisions that break organic flow and rhythm. We start trying to force the Real World to move towards the Ideal World before adequate foundations are laid. This reaction against pain tends to undermine the progress towards the Ideal.

So, for me in the last year, the challenge has been to have a foot solidly in both worlds (Ideal and Real) and be present with the disappointments, pain and impatience born of feeling the chasm between. Here are a few recommendations based on what has been helpful for me:

1) Visualize what you want to manifest and savor it in silence for a time. Meditate on it. Think lightly about it. Don't move with it, share it or do anything for a time. True creation is born of stillness and, during the time of stillness, subtle forces in you are working to align your energy, purpose and resources to birth that dream. The energetic structure builds imperceptibly with its own logic and rhythm. And if you move forward into the active phase of manifesting too early, you can lose center and break flow.

2) Commit to it. No need for drama or heroics, just a solid, sure commitment. This provides the anchor in yourself that sets the process in motion of calling forces towards you and building the capacity to mobilize something and collaborate effectively. Until you are solid in your commitment, not much will move forward. Commitment creates the container for birthing.

3) Start talking to others about it. Hold the project lightly but passionately. Let it be shaped by their reactions and ideas but not distorted.

4) Apprentice with someone who has the skills and capacities you need.. Specific training is often less important than osmosing -- taking in a whole way of being. Spending time in the presence of mastery calls forth the place of mastery in ourselves. Apprenticing allows you to learn much more quickly than by going through a study process by yourself.

5) Soften truthfully into the pain you feel, the ache of unfulfilled dreams, of unused talent, of a lurching business, of an aching heart, etc.. The more surrendered that you can be with that, the better. Manifesting anything will often be a long series of disappointments as events don't go according to plan. When you soften into the pain of each failure, you take in the full wisdom that each of those experiences is conveying. Once the lessons are learned, you can move on to lessons on the next level. Pain avoided only lengthens the learning curve.

6) Ask for help as often as you can AND do so while still taking responsibility for moving things forward yourself. When you abdicate responsibility, a manipulative cycle springs into being where you are trying to trick someone into actions rather than offer them the choice. (I know this one well!). On the flip side, when you neglect to ask others for help, many forces that will come to your aid cannot arrive.

7) Take time periodically to reconnect to the vision in stillness, not doing anything. Those times are when the structure of your dream is strengthening and impacting the larger fields of energy in which we live. If you find yourself trying to force something to move forward out of deep impatience, undertake the discipline of silence and non-action, which helps to line everything back up again.

8) Be tenacious. Have a single-mindedness about the goal and patience as to timing. Often there are many things in ourselves and the world that need to fall into place before specific visions can be born. Are you willing to stick with it even if it takes three times as long as you want?

9) Take all setbacks as teachers. Assume they are clearing out some attachment, fear, or pattern to enable your future success. I like to think of failures as a curriculum and my job is to study them until they reveal their full lessons.

The extended network on this list-serve is doing deep and powerful work and I know many who are feeling burned out. I hope some of these principles help you take heart, lengthen the time horizon, and surrender into the lessons, while trusting the deeper vision that is still coming into being....