This post follows on from the post entitled Dreaming and relates to the second step in My 7 Steps to Success.
What is the point of this Step?.... This will be make the difference as to whether your mind will activate your subconscious to start the process of turning your "Dreams 2 Reality" or not, without it your dreams could remain just that... dreams. It is about checking the dreams you discovered to make sure that they are yours, not your perception of what you think someone else wants you to dream. It's about checking if your dream will really be fulfilling your destiny and your highest values.
Discovering your Highest Values
Dr. John Demartini is "The Values Guy" and I find his story incredibly inspiring. From being down and out and on the verge of death, he became acquainted with the concept of fulfillment of one's highest values. Despite being told that he would never be able to read or amount to anything, he took the challenge and set out to overcome his . He became hungry for knowledge through reading. He has accumulated and continues to accumulate a wealth of knowledge which he uses as he fulfils one of his highest values, teaching, by spreading the knowledge he has gained. He has attained a high level of success and monetary wealth and can charge vast sums of money for his time as he spends most of it travelling around the world teaching and inspiring people.
My understanding of his philosophy regarding values is as follows:
We spend our time and energy on fulfilling our highest values. When we work towards any other values, such as what we admire in someone else or what we perceive as someone else's expectations of us, we will find ourselves struggling through life, uninspired and without energy. During these times we may find ourselves procrastinating, putting off what we think we should be doing, daydreaming, or doing other stuff that seems to get us nowhere. Often our highest values relate to the other stuff we find ourselves doing instead of the stuff we are "supposed" to be doing.
This reminds me of Paulo Coehlo's book, The Alchemist, in which the hero sets out on a quest for the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life. The philosopher's stone can turn any substance into gold and the elixir of life gives its drinker eternal youth. During the quest, the hero goes through periods of great success and some of grave despair. The times of great success and wealth are related to when he is engaged in his life's purpose, in his quest. When he gets distracted along the way, his success turns sour, life catches up and the success that he had found before, disappeared. It was only when he resumed his quest that things "started going his way" again.
Similarly you will find that, while remaining true to your highest values, and while continuing on your lifes "quest" things will tend to go your way, you will feel motivated and inspired. People will sense your inherent confidence because you believe in what you are doing and where you are going. They will respond to your self confidence with confidence in you and you will grow while you help others to grow around you.
How can you identify your highest values?
Start by answering the following questions and identifying areas that repeat themselves in your answers:
Where do you spend your energy and money?
What inspires you?
What do you spend most of your time doing?
What goals have you seen most success in achieving?
What do you love to read about or research?
The process is described in detail in Dr Demartini's book The Values Factor. For a more in depth approach, enroll in one of his courses such as his Breakthrough Experience.
Linking your Dream to your Highest Values
Once you have identified some of your highest values, go back to your dreams and ask: How does this dream fulfill these values? How will making this dream a reality bring me closer to my purpose or destiny? How will it fulfill me?
One way or another, a link must be found between your highest values and your dream. If you can't find a link, you may need to re-investigate your dreams or search a bit harder for the link.
When you identify the link between what you want and your life's purpose, your subconscious is engaged to find a way to fulfill that dream. You will find that you notice things that you didn't notice before, that opportunities seems to appear that might have always been there, but you didn't see them because you hadn't created the link between your mind and your infinite creativity and resourcefulness.
This is a time to start getting really excited. The challenge now is to create order among those thoughts and ideas. The next step in the process is Setting the Goal and I will blog on this step soon. In the Meantime check out Andrew Matthews' post on SMART Goal Setting on the Evoke Coaching Blog
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