Self-Awareness for Everyone MJ Blehart

What do you do when you can’t find the words?
Sometimes you just don’t know what to say or write. It’s never just the words you use. Even the written word can convey a degree of tone, intent, and attitude.
Communication is a complex mechanism of expression employed to convey ideas. It’s how you and I can share notions, agree and disagree, and expand (or, frankly, shrink) our overall knowledge base.
Communication can be both internal and external.
Communication within and without
Whole people are made up of 4 specific elements. One is tangible, the physical. The other three are intangible, the mental, emotional, and spiritual. Everyone has these four elements to themselves, yet how developed each is varies wildly.
The intangible elements have a rather intense impact on how communication works. This is why it’s more than words. Words are physical. That means there is still a mental, emotional, and spiritual element to all communications.
Most of these are incredibly subtle. That’s because of the intangible nature of the mental, emotional, and spiritual. This is also where miscommunication is frequently born.
Words and body language go hand-in-hand when it comes to in-person conversations. Looks, how you stand, sighs, what you do with your hands, coupled with the words you speak convey an almost surreal amount of information.
Communication is never just words
You can be with a person, in the same space, and still misspeak, misinterpret information, and misunderstand. You think you’re expressing yourself, you think you’re reading another’s cues, and then learn you utterly failed to communicate with one another properly, and now there’s hurt.
Even the unintentional hurt caused by miscommunication feels bad both given and received.
What do you do when you can’t find the words? For me, the answer is to keep searching. Maybe they’re not here now, but they always come when called.
Become more consciously aware and mindful of your own nonverbal, wordless communication styles. I’ve had a real eye-opener into how what I do and don’t do, without words, can create an incredible degree of misunderstanding, which in turn leads to hurt feelings. That sucks.
I can choose to learn a lesson from it, and by recognizing, acknowledging, and being accountable for my failed communication beyond words, I can grow and learn. You can do this, too.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Before you say anything to anyone, or send a DM or email, no matter what the topic is, pause. Consider your words, what they are, and what they will convey. Think about nonverbal elements that might go into it. Then act from there.
It might not seem like much, but sometimes pausing and considering before acting can avoid confusion, miscommunication, misunderstanding, and other issues before they might even occur.
Be mindful of what words and nonverbal communication you put out into the world.

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Every great began as a beginner
Whether they were a leader, writer, painter, artist, athlete, or whatever, they started as a beginner.
Nobody enters any given field as an expert. Nobody.
Yes, some people advance quicker than others. This is dependent on inherent skill and/or talent, how they learn, how fast they learn, natural ability, and all sorts of other factors along the way.
Still, even those who have the most gifts and innate proficiencies begin as beginners. Nobody starts at the top of their game. Unfortunately, there’s a loud false narrative about the latently able starting at the top.
It’s okay when you don’t get it right at the start
There are, of course, numerous stories of people making lots and lots and lots of attempts before succeeding. Some of the most successful people in history endured tons of failures, false starts, and other challenges on the way to their success. They tried and failed and chose to keep working. They didn’t do the half-assed, half-hearted “try” Yoda warns against in my favorite quote,
“Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.”
They do. It’s an attempt, but an action that is doing rather than half-assed trying.
The process is never the same for any creation, discovery, recognition, or success. The process, however, is similar.
Thought leads to idea à Idea leads to actionable item à Actionable item leads to action à Action leads to learning from success or failure.
The top of their game isn’t necessarily THE top
The GOATs all began as beginners. Not a single one of them appeared on the scene fully formed, greater than any other, ever. Holding them up as the pinnacle of achievement is often touted as inspiring. Yet frequently it has the exact opposite effect.
Mindfulness to reach the top of their game
Very seldom, almost impossibly seldom, does someone luck into the top of their game. Unplanned success and achievement at any given thing is almost mythical, like dragons.
Nobody truly starts at the top of their game. They do the work, they attempt and have small successes or failures, and they make new attempts again and again until they succeed. That action isn’t chance or luck or random happenstance. It’s mindfulness.
Active conscious awareness is mindfulness. Success and what it is varies from person to person. Measuring success is a highly individual matter. What’s more, success is different for every individual. Maybe you’re a beginner, maybe in the middle, or maybe at the top of your game. Wherever you are, mindfulness is the key to getting where you desire to go.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Try something you’ve never done before.
Is there something you’ve been curious about trying out? Is there something new that has caught your attention you want to attempt to do? Might there be something you’ve not attempted because you were worried that you’d not be good at it?
Do it. Take that thing and do it. OR, if there is nothing already in your queue, take up a new art/hobby/activity that piques your interest. Don’t worry that you might suck at it, that’s how everyone starts. Be the beginner and try this new thing.
Write down what it is, how it goes, and how it’s making you feel.

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Why are choices and decisions so powerful?
What you’re never taught in school is how to be yourself. You’re taught to read, write, communicate with others, and be part of the machine of your given society. You’re never taught how to know yourself, basic psychology is only covered when you reach college (only if you bother with college and take any path along that line), and self-learning is not something you’re taught.
The truth of this life is that you are not just a cog in the machine. Rather, you’re a human, being. You’re capable of some pretty amazing things.
The gurus, demagogues, and supposedly elite of society aren’t better than you and me. They are not more worthy and deserving. They’ve just broken away from the herd, tasted power, and decided to hoard it for themselves and treat the rest of us like sheep. They’ve done what they tell you can’t and shouldn’t be done to maintain the false control and power they perceive themselves as having.
Recognizing that you have the same power is imperative. Accessing it is easier than you realize. It’s simply a matter of employing active conscious awareness and making choices and decisions.
Mindfulness is all about choices and decisions
Leaving the rote, routine, and subconscious living behind can be done by working with active conscious awareness.
To use active conscious awareness to make choices and decisions is a matter of mindfulness. To begin practicing mindfulness, you just need to be present, here and now.
Action often implies the physical. The truth is, it’s not literally what you do as much as it’s choices and decisions that you make.
If you’ve not been a regular maker of choices and decisions, you’d be amazed at how often you have opportunities you don’t consider. Even the most minor choices and decisions build strength to make larger and more impressive/more important things in your life.
Actively choosing and deciding is how you can gain what little control over your life experience is available to you. Yet that seemingly little control is the key to being who, what, where, how, and why you desire to be.
Choices and decisions empower you
Most of the “power” claimed by leaders, gurus, demagogues, and the like is utterly false. The first step in taking the wheel to drive your life and choose your path is to exercise choices and decisions. Turn off the autopilot, and don’t let yourself follow rote and routine and habit. Instead, choose and decide things. Actively and consciously apply mindfulness to make more choices and decisions.
This is the most empowering thing you can do for yourself. You are the only you that is, and you are not just here to exist and survive this life. You’re here to experience, explore, grow, evolve, and thrive. Choices and decisions are how you gain control on any level. You, and I mean you, are worthy and deserving of this.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Today, take a moment to write down every choice and decision you make. No matter how large or small, write it down.
At the end of the day, mark all the choices and decisions you normally disregard as unimportant or make almost entirely by rote and routine.
Repeat this process tomorrow, and see if you add any new active, consciously aware decisions to your practice.
Once more, at the end of the day, mark all the choices and decisions you normally disregard as unimportant or make almost entirely by rote and routine.
Examine if this has a positive, negative, or neutral impact on your self-awareness. Continue to work with this as necessary.

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You might get broken, but you won’t be beaten
The modern world is obsessed with extremes. So many things are viewed as either/or, rather than the far vaster middle between them. It’s all black or white, never mind the shades of grey and myriad of colors between the opposite poles.
One Size Fits All never fits all. Yet you’re constantly bombarded by messages to conform, to find your accepted place in society, and to be a cog in the machine.
When it comes to your mental, emotional, and spiritual health, wellness, and wellbeing, lots of things might break you along the way.
Nobody teaches you any better
You’re taught throughout your youth to care for your body in numerous ways. Diet, exercise, dental care, hair and skin care, all of these get tons of focus and you’re taught to mind them. This is not true of your intangible, other elements of your being, however.
Thus, stress, fear, anxiety, depression, and uncertainty are invisible illnesses that silently attack the physical via the mental, emotional, and spiritual. This can become quickly overwhelming, especially if you fall for the messages of lack, scarcity, and insufficiency, then turn outwards to solve these matters.
However, the first step to any healing when you’re broken starts within.
It’s all about mindfulness and choice
You have more power than you probably realize.
When you get broken physically, fixing the damage is usually direct. Mental, emotional, and spiritual damage is another matter. There is no One True Way for everyone, with one exception. Active conscious awareness, i.e., mindfulness.
Mindfulness practice of this sort begins with becoming consciously aware of what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what your intentions are, the positivity or negativity of your life approach, and what you are or aren’t doing.
So, you might (and let’s face it, most probably will) get broken in one or more of the elements of your health, wellness, and wellbeing along the way. However, you won’t be beaten unless you allow yourself to be.
Broken but not beaten is a choice
Some challenges will feel insurmountable in this life. So long as you are here, drawing breath, and capable of independent thought, feeling, action, and intention, you won’t be beaten. Unless you allow yourself to be.
Everyone gets broken along the way. That’s the nature of the human condition. So long as you live, you can recover.
There are always resources to help you heal. No matter how you’re broken – physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually – something is available to you to aid your recovery.
When you get broken you are not beaten unless you allow yourself to be. Unconditionally, you are worthy and deserving of making choices and decisions to heal on any and all levels necessary.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Think back on a previous experience that broke you. Were you broken physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, or in multiple ways?
How did you recover? What did you do to help that? Did you take steps to aid your recovery?
Write it all down and keep it handy so that, the next time you’re broken, you’ll see that you’ve been broken – but not beaten - before, and can do it again.

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Tapping into this place between the subconscious and conscious mind
The Void or The Flow State are references to that place outside of time and space where you simply are. They’re the ultimate expression of the here and now — the present moment. In the flow, you ride along aware and unaware at the same time. It’s an amazing disconnect where super cool things happen.
Creativity directly connects you to The Void or The Flow State. That is one of the best ways to see, recognize, and develop your empowerment.
The three states of mind
Everyone everywhere is made up of three minds. The first is the unconscious mind. The unconscious mind is how your neurons fire to make your muscles do things, your heart beat, your lungs breathe, digestive system process food, and so on.
The second is the subconscious mind. This is where your memories, values, beliefs, and habits live. For the most part, they simply are. You can access them at will, but that requires a conscious act.
The conscious mind is your inner mindset/headspace/psyche self, as you perceive it here and now. It’s the conscious awareness of who, what, where, how, and why you are, now. Via the conscious mind, you can access the subconscious to make changes, create new habits, review old memories, and so on.
Two specific and separate places exist between the conscious and subconscious mind. One is the ego. The other space between the conscious and subconscious mind is The Void or The Flow State. This is a place where you simply are, being, doing, and existing, here and now. The Void or The Flow State lacks ego and loses track of time.
How does the void of the flow state work?
When you reach this place, you tend to find yourself in a metaphorical current, being carried along by the act of creating, working your mind, body, and/or soul. It’s a place where thought, feeling, intention, approach, and action are one, moving automatically. Unlike the automation of habit, rote, and routine, however, The Void or The Flow State results from mindful conscious awareness action.
This differs from habit, rote, and routine, because it’s a product of intent. You are doing a thing consciously and intentionally, rather than habitually and subconsciously. The act of the doing combined with the intent leads to The Void or The Flow State.
When you work in this place, it’s one of the most empowering feelings you can get.
The Void or The Flow State can’t be forced
Trying to force your way into The Void or The Flow State will have the opposite effect. Instead of being in that place where you are - doing, being, creating, in the now – you’ll connect to the ego and its artificial reflection and expression of who, what, where, how, and why you believe you are. This will keep you out of The Void or The Flow State because it’s missing the element of surrender.
Why is this so empowering? Because any act where you have reached the ultimate place of present conscious awareness is your doing. Because you thought, felt, intended, and acted on something to make a thing happen, and then allowed it to be, you empowered yourself from the start.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
Set aside 30-60 minutes to do an activity that you enjoy.
To attempt to get into the void or the flow state, begin with a 2-minute breathing exercise. Set a timer. Breathe in as deeply as you can. Then, breathe out completely. Repeat for the full 2 minutes.
Once your breathing exercise is complete, go to it. Do the activity you set the time to do. Allow yourself to get completely immersed in it.
Once you’re done, check how long you were at it. Did you lose track of time? Did it feel as if you simply were doing and being, in the moment? If yes, you experienced working from the void or a flow state.

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Gratitude is essential to our health, wellness, and wellbeing
Gratitude is never a bad thing. It is a matter of positivity and it always builds and never destroys. Saying thank you, and meaning it, expressing the feeling behind gratitude is a tool for change. When we express how grateful we are for things we have, things we receive, tangibles or intangibles, we empower ourselves, as well as those around us.
Gratitude in this way also improves our health, wellness, and wellbeing. On every level, gratitude is important to mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health, wellness, and wellbeing.
In the face of institutionalized disempowerment and disenfranchisement, we need every tool we can get to fix this.
Gratitude is not selfish
Not to put too fine a point on it, but feeling grateful and expressing gratitude is not an act of selfishness.
How can I express gratitude when so many people are suffering so horridly? Because feeling grateful for things in no way disempowers anyone else. All those people who are experiencing awful things and suffering do not have their lot in life made worse when you are thankful for things.
I know how hard this is. But consciousness creates reality. When we get focused on all this awfulness around us, we discuss it, we rant about it, we feel terrible seeing it, then we inadvertently energize it more. Being grateful and expressing gratitude is positive.
Tangible or intangible, big or small, gratitude is always empowering
There is no such thing as negative gratitude. Sure, there’s false gratitude, but that’s not gratitude. Genuine, true, real gratitude is always positive. 
Genuine gratitude is an expression of appreciation. Appreciation is a direct pathway to kindness, compassion, and empathy. Everyone, everywhere, desires kindness, compassion, and empathy. Saying thank you, giving thanks, and offering gratitude are all positive, empowering acts. What’s more, they are just as powerful when given as when received.
Gratitude is abundance
Saying thank you, and FEELING thankful is empowering. When you receive genuine thanks, doesn’t it make you feel good? Giving it is equally – if not more powerful than - receiving it. The number of things for which we can be grateful are infinite.
Mindfulness and gratitude
How can you recognize and apply genuine gratitude? By using mindfulness.
This form of mindfulness is active conscious awareness. It’s not recognizing the world without via your six senses, though that is a factor. It’s more about knowing your inner being. To do that requires active conscious awareness. This is a matter of recognizing, here and now, in the present, what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what your intent is, if your approach is one of positivity or negativity, and what your actions are or aren’t.
Tangible or intangible, big or small, gratitude is always empowering and always positive.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
In the now, say and feel Thank You at least a dozen times today. Whether to someone or something or to yourself, say it. When you say it, think it, feel it, and intend it.
In this way, you empower yourself to change your life for the better. Gratitude is an expression of appreciation. Because like attracts like, appreciation appreciates. In this way, not only do you empower your life for the better, you empower the world for the better.
To give this an extra boost, at the end of the day, before you go to bed, write out at least 5 things you are grateful for. Read what you write and put the energy into it to feel it.
This practice can be applied forever.

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