lovenotfear Thoughts and inspiration for a happier you

You know how sometimes you come across someone who is rude to waiters, belittles parking attendants, treats their partner badly and just generally leaves you feeling not-so-nice? It occurred to me that those very people probably don’t know that they are assholes…

So I thought a little tool might be useful in very quickly identifying our asshole-potential!

Now I know it’s not nice to think that YOU might be an asshole but alas, sometimes one must consider it as a possibility. And if you’re not, let this help you identify any people in your life who might be in danger of becoming an asshole or who are already giant assholes.

Simply answer YES or NO to the following questions

1. Have you fallen out with one or more friends in the last year?
2. Have you had any kind of falling out with any of your family members in the last year?
3. Do any of your husband / wife / partner’s friends dislike you?
4. Could you describe any of your close friendships or relationships as volatile, or “up and down”.
5. Do you ever get the feeling that those close to you are walking on eggshells, afraid of upsetting you?
6. Are there times when you truly dislike yourself?
7. Do you ever wish harm or unhappiness on others?
8. Have your colleagues ever complained to your superiors about your attitude?
9. Have you made someone close to you cry in the last three months?
10. Do you ever get the feeling that people are purposefully avoiding you?
11. Has anyone told you in the last six months that you are mean, nasty, selfish, spiteful or manipulative?
12. Has anyone purposefully damaged your property or acted maliciously towards you in the last year “to get you back”?
13. Do you often find yourself enthusiastically gossiping about other people?
14. Has someone actually called you an asshole or similar in the past six months?

Now count up all your YES answers…

0 YES answers

You’re a saint. You’re a good person. You’re lovely. You’re nice. But you must beware of being a doormat. Read those questions again and see if anyone in your life sprung to mind as you read… If so, you might be in danger of giving too much of your precious time and energy to an asshole. Think about it. If you do feel like you’re the flipside to someone else’s asshole coin, start making changes today. Don’t forget that as nice as it is to be nice, it’s not nice when your niceness allows someone else to be not nice to you.

1 – 4 YES answers

That’s ok. It’s normal to have the odd little drama here and there – we’re all human after all. Sometimes we’re misunderstood. Sometimes we’re grumpy as all hell. Sometimes we’re going through stuff and sometimes we’re just premenstrual and have a brat attack for no good reason and That’s ok. Just be aware of how often you have emo drama in your life and keep it to a minimum.

5 – 8 YES answers

Look at your answers again carefully and make sure you are not just persecuting yourself. Are all your YES answers true, or are you making unfair assumptions and judgements about yourself? If they really are true, then see where you can slowly start to change your behaviour to the benefit of yourself and those around you. Look at what your triggers are and dig deep to try to understand why things trigger you into behaving in the way of the asshole. What are your personality traits, characteristics, attitudes or behaviours that account for most of your YES answers above? For instance – jealousy or low self-esteem or aggression or sarcasm or manipulation. What should you be doing LESS of and which behaviours or attitudes (like empathy, compassion, patience etc.) should you be practising more? Come on. Make an effort to be nicer.

More than 8 YES answers

Woah, Nelly! If you really had more than 8 YES answers, you should probably find some time to examine WHY. Are you holding onto old anger and resentment? Are you acting and speaking from your truth or are you always defending yourself? Are you always making excuses for your behaviour and blaming others for the drama in your life? Or, if you’re truthful, do you realise that most of the time, it is in fact YOUR shitty attitude that causes problems in your relationships? If so, it’s time to admit that you are not being the best you that you can be. DON’T PANIC. You can learn to understand and love yourself better. You can change your attitude towards life. You can change your behaviour towards other people and build more meaningful and truthful relationships. But it is most definitely time to make a change. Get your shit together, asshole.

I first encountered The Law of Attraction about 10 years ago.

My girlfriend and I had broken up and the digital camera was unfortunately hers… I really wanted to get myself a cool little camera so I could keep playing but alas, I was completely broke, what with moving and deposit etc. and my salary was stretched to capacity anyway.

Nonetheless, in the weeks that followed, I would go into Game or similar and price the cameras I liked. Of course I knew the chances of me having 4 or 5 K to buy a camera were quite skraal BUT I looked anyway. One night I sat with my pen and notebook and did this little exercise where I wrote down all sorts of cool ideas for when I had my camera one day.

That Friday I was at work when one of the guys in the office sent an email around saying that BA’s in-flight magazine were running an amateur photographic competition and that the entries closed at 5pm that day. The prize? A Nikon P5000 worth R4500!

Uh-huh!

I went home and got some pics I’d taken in Switzerland and France and raced back to the office, scanned a few and sent them. I don’t think I expected to win, but I also didn’t expect not to. I think I just let it go.

Now one would think it would take weeks before you even heard from them but the very next Monday I received a call from a lady saying I had won the camera. All she needed was my delivery address!

I kid you not, within a week of spending the time and energy writing down what I would DO with a camera, that very camera came to me!

That, I believe, is the Law of Attraction.

Not too long after that, The Secret came out. It took me a few years to see movie, but I had never forgotten the sentiment. Or rather, it comes back to me every now and again.

Deepak Chopra talks about the Law of Intent and Desire, and says that inherent in every desire are the mechanics for its fulfillment. He says we can literally change the energy not only within our own bodies but also within our environment – to the extent that we can cause things to manifest in it. (Things like a camera or a car or love or health or money.)

This change is brought about by two qualities inherent in consciousness: Attention and Intention.

Attention energises, while Intention transforms.

Whatever we put out attention on, will grow. If we take our attention away, it will wither.

So it stands to reason that if you are constantly thinking your boyfriend is going to cheat you, chances are he will cheat on you, because you have given so much attention to “your boyfriend cheating”. You have attracted it to yourself.

In the secret they say:

“Whatever you are thinking, is in the process of becoming.”

If you feel blessed and lucky and you’re grateful, you will attract more of the same.
If you are always complaining about how bad things are, things will just get worse.
If you truly want something, and your intention is pure and energised, it will come to you.

But back to Deepak:

“In most people, Desire can be described as Intention with an ATTACHMENT to the outcome.”

The way I understand this is… for instance:

• You are desperate for a specific person to ask you to a party because you believe it will lead to love and you’ll just die if they don’t end up loving you;
• you’re so anxious and nervous about whether or not you’ll be approved for that vehicle loan that it keeps you awake at nights;
• you really really really want a house that will impress your friends and your enemies.

Do you see the pattern there? The attachment to the outcome is linked to fear. Fear of rejection, failure, whatever. There’s too much going on. It’s not simple anymore.

Deepak Chopra says the true power or desire lies in practicing Intent with DETACHMENT. In other words, you are genuinely OK with the outcome, because you TRUST IN THE INFINITE ORGANISING ABILITIES OF THE UNIVERSE.

So you’ll be more likely to manifest a beautiful mountain bike if the reason you want that bicycle is because you feel FREE when you’re on it… and not because you “MUST lose 10 kgs for your ex’s wedding”.

If you want to manifest lots of lovely ZAR (or any other currency) in your bank account, it won’t happen if you feel guilty for wanting it or if you keep questioning yourself and asking: “But how? I earn a crap salary. I won’t ever have lots of money in my account”.

YOU don’t have to worry about the detail. You simply have to be present and aware of what you need and want and not focus on the future outcome or the details.

More from Deepak:

How can you harness the power of intention to fulfil your dreams and desires? You can get results through effort, but if you follow these steps your intent will generate its own power.

1. Centre yourself in the silent space between thoughts – in the essential state of being.
2. Release your intentions and desires with the expectation that they will bloom when the season is right.
3. Keep your desires to yourself. Don’t share them with anyone unless they are closely bonded with you.
4. Relinquish your attachment to the outcome.
5. Let the Universe handle the details.

I interpret those steps like this:

1. Learn how to be still and simply breathing. Learn to listen to yourself and understand what it is you truly, honestly and purely want.
2. Put some energy into it – do something positive in the direction of your desire. This shouldn’t be EFFORT – not tiresome phone calls etc. Draw a picture of the life you want, go into a showroom and test drive that car, circle the FOR SALE ads in the farming section. BE FREE!
3. Sometimes when you talk too much about doing something, you forget the doing bit. And I reckon sometimes you talk so much about something, it’s released too loudly and it flutters away. Or something like that.
4. Don’t be desperate or attach too many other things to what you want. Know that things will be as they should be.
5. Don’t fret about the detail. You’ll only convince yourself it can’t happen. You can’t control it at all, so all that energy will simply be wasted.

So… if you find some quiet time this week, why not think about what it is you desire, right now, in your life. And then follow the steps above and see what happens! You can start off by attempting to manifest something small and short-term and then as you get to understand better what you want in the longer term, put it out there!

I have a newer, fancier Canon these days, but my trusty little Nikon is still going and perfect for festivals and hiking. It’s compact and it takes awesome photos.