How to Start: My 3 Favourite Practises to Help Start Something
The words I wish someone would have told me earlier to help support knowing what it is I wanted and discovering how to get there.
Are you utterly lost in the confusion and overwhelm of indecision and inaction? Do you have an idea but are you lost on where to take it? Or what to do first? Are you tied up in the emotions of overwhelm, sadness, or anger at not being able to do the things you know you are meant to? I’ve been there and what follows is my offering of supports: The words I wish someone would have told me earlier to help support knowing what it is I wanted and discovering how to get there.
First off — I’m an Aries, the first sign of the zodiac. Aries is the sign that charges forward. They are known to be confident, head strong, and energetic while also sometimes naive and not always prone to finishing what it is they start BUT want I want to reiterate is the importance: THEY START.
I’m articulating their faults of naivety and lack of follow through because like everything in life, there is the balance of positive and negative, of light and shadow. An Aries may start but they also need to rely on other skillsets and attributed of their character and the other signs in their chart to see tasks through to completion. Both positive and negative qualities are important so that we can understand ourselves in an integrated and wise way. To become wise, we must fail and we must learn from experience. Sometimes like the naive youth we will make mistakes but the important thing is; is that we CONTINUE, and to do that we must start and often start anew.
Here I will share with you three practises that will help to create your own sense of self. From my experience one of the main blockages that kept me from making any decisions or moving towards starting any actions was fear. The fear that I didn’t actually know what I wanted, confusion over whose voice was my own, and doubt that I had the capacity to achieve any of what I would like for myself. Thankfully, there are tools to learn about how to MOVE THROUGH the fear.
THREE TOOLS I WISH I HAD KNOWN AND USED SOONER & THAT YOU CAN USE TOO:
1. Consistently Journaling:
This is actually a HUGE step. The practise of making time for your voice and to put it on paper is HUGE. It brings the thoughts and ideas you have and makes space for them physically on the paper. To write down your ideas visually reiterated to yourself that you have given your ideas a place in this world. This act represents you being allowed to take up space and clears out any of the confusion and untruth you may be holding within you. As the words make their way onto the page you have the opportunity to sift through and see for yourself all the muddled ideas or the gems in the rough. The key to all of this though is consistency and one of the most important things is that you treat this time of journalling for yourself as sacred. Like any new skill there will be failure and a day or two that you don’t make time to write down your own words but with time and practise you will get there. Here I recommend being super truthful. Say the things you want to say but that you can’t out-loud. Call out the injustices you witness and see how as you write you come to clearer understanding. Say the outrageous dreams and aspirations no one else will believe. With consistency what may initially be harsh words or unrealistic aspirations will eventually blend into deeper understanding of yourself AND also other people. Let it out genuinely because the beautiful thing about a journal is that you can finally see the things you may have been denying yourself and then you can act from a deeper place of clarity and truth. Often as we get clearer we also invite in a bigger perspective.
2. A Boundary Exercise:
A boundary exercise can look many ways and if you have one you like or already know you can use that one. If you have no idea what a boundary exercise is, I like to think of them as a practise to help discern where you begin and where you end. Some people find boundary exercises difficult because they are stuck in the one-sided perspective that we are all one. While yes, of course there is truth in this universal concept of us all being connected to actually know this— you also need to define yourself. To define yourself is to know from what place or “who it is” that you are relating to “oneness”. So many people look to relate to the idea of oneness without taking the time to define themselves. It’s like the idea of the positive and negative and how in reality we can’t have one without the other. To have darkness then allows an opposite for the light to exist. If we didn’t have the night how would we know or define what daylight was? We would only know the night and we would not be able to have a term for darkness because there wouldn’t be anything else to help define it. See here how important is is to experience BOTH. To experience your own sense of self so that you can experience wholeness or oneness as something bigger than yourself.
A simple boundary visualization:
Sit and close your eyes
Take three full breaths
Take your awareness above your head and take three full breaths here sensing into the space above your head
Take your awareness below you and take three full breaths sensing into the space below you
Do the same as above but for infront of you
Do the same for behind
To your left and then your right (or right and then your left)
Take your awareness to your centre and towards your heart and breathe here.
There are many ways you can imagine your boundary and I would recommend connecting to this more fully. The one described about is a tool of orientating yourself in the world. There is deep wisdom in doing this and if this is something you are interested in taking further I would recommend seeking an Elder or meditation coach to help guide you and connect you with the long history and traditions that this practise holds. I am not qualified to share this wisdom and recognize my own limitations in sharing the full extent of this knowledge. The practise I have described above is profound and yet a simpler version to respect the different traditions and cultural knowledge that must be shared in a very specific, integrated, and holistic ways from someone who holds that knowledge and relationship to those practises.
A boundary exercise has the capacity to create meaningful and impactful change in your life. Like any exercise as you practise and strengthen this “boundary muscle” it will grow and this will start to allow you to set clearer and clearer boundaries on your time and allow you to create genuine time for yourself and for your own self exploration. This means setting aside time for your journaling and self care. This means time for you so that you can become clear on who you are and relate more clearly to the world around you.
3. Connecting with Something Bigger than Yourself
Maybe you belief in God, or maybe you find love and support in Nature. What matters is that you create time and foster relationship with something that is bigger than yourself. The act of prayer, meditation, or conversation with the divine can look many different ways. If you don’t know where to start I’d suggest a gratitude practise and thanking your version of Creator each and every day. Name at least three things you are grateful for and see how as you share your gratitude with something bigger than yourself it will transform the the relationship you hold with the world!
I honestly know from experience that each of these practises will connect you more fully to your authenticity and therefore expand your capacity to relate to the world in a more genuine and fulfilling way. These practises will move you into a more balanced perspective to make decisions from and will make space for you to move you ideas into action! These practises will act like a bridging force to create relationship to the space that holds duality so that you too can feel balanced and make decisions from a place that is integrated and whole!
Again, like any journey there is the place in which you start out. Like the heroes journey… the important thing is that the hero starts. So often it is the first step that are the hardest because we have no idea of where it is we are going, what it is we will do, or how we will go about doing it. The first steps are the ones filled with ample falls. Like a child learning to walk and yet we each have the things that call to us and that we are destined to do. I hope this is helps you along your journey. Know that even if you fall— the important thing is that you try, and try again. You too my friend can start.