Dream Work 5: Making Your Enemies into Friends

“Let them at all times concern themselves with doing a kindly thing for one of their fellows, offering to someone love, consideration, thoughtful help. Let them see no one as their enemy, or as wishing them ill, but think of all humankind as their friends; regarding the alien as an intimate, the stranger as a …

Dreamwork 4: Taking Responsibility/Leaving Blame Behind

The way I teach dream work requires that at some point people identify the origins in their lives when negative experiences happened which caused the ego to go into a survivor/protector mode.    The theory of working with the ego is that because it is an aspect of our animal heritage,  it therefore belongs to the …

Dreamwork 3: When Your Metaphor Hits Resistance

Today I received this dream after the post from yesterday. This morning I had a dream I as swimming along a beach trying to get to a distant goal along the beach. About 100 yards out from the beach was a huge wall. I was trying to swim towards the shore, but I got pushed …

Dreamwork 2: Life is a Metaphor

O MY SERVANT! Thou art even as a finely tempered sword concealed in the darkness of its sheath and its value hidden from the artificer’s knowledge. Wherefore come forth from the sheath of self and desire that thy worth may be made resplendent and manifest unto all the world.  Baha’u’llah The thing that differentiates the …

Dream Work 1: Where Do Dreams Come From and How Do I Begin to Understand Their Meaning

Dream work is the ability to take a dream,  analyze and understand the messages it is trying to convey, and then do the internal transformation to actualize new positive energy that the dream is trying to move you toward.      Dream interpretation is one part of the dream work process.    It is the purpose of this …

Day 19: Why the Future World is So Unrecognizable to Us

O Thou our Provider! Send down Thine aid, that each one gathered here may become a lighted candle, each one a centre of attraction, each one a summoner to Thy heavenly realms, till at last we make this nether world the mirror image of Thy Paradise.        Abdu’l Baha The future world is very difficult for …

Day 16: Returning to the Vision of Your Life with the New Virtue

The Great Being saith: Regard man as a mine rich in gems of inestimable value. Education can, alone, cause it to reveal its treasures, and enable mankind to benefit therefrom…. Baha’u’llah Last night I had a very interesting dream in which I was in the next world (according to the dream).  It wasn’t like I …

Day 15: Being Attracted to the Difficult Thing

O SON OF MAN! If adversity befall thee not in My path, how canst thou walk in the ways of them that are content with My pleasure? If trials afflict thee not in thy longing to meet Me, how wilt thou attain the light in thy love for My beauty?  Baha’u’llah The other day I …

Day 14: The Best Asset is a Positive Memory

Thus is it incumbent upon us, when we direct our gaze toward other people, to see where they excel, not where they fail.  Abdu’l Baha You have just come out of a really bad meeting with your supervisor who has managed to tell you what an awful job you are doing at work.   It is …

Day 13: Day of Reflection/Meditation

The light of a good character surpasseth the light of the sun and the radiance thereof. Whoso attaineth unto it is accounted as a jewel among men.  Baha’u’llah After having done a day of maximum effort, it is often very valuable to do a day where the focus is reflection.    In today’s material world especially …

Day 12: Challenging Yourself for a Day

Make thou an effort that thou mayest take thy place under the sun and receive an abundant share of its dazzling light.     (Abdu’l-Baha, Selections from the Writings of Abdu’l-Baha, p. 56) The reality of any kind of transformation plan is that it requires a great deal of effort.   You cannot become fit by sitting …

Day 11: Communicating With Your Future Self

“Honesty, virtue, wisdom and a saintly character redound to the exaltation of man, while dishonesty, imposture, ignorance and hypocrisy lead to his abasement. By My life! Man’s distinction lieth not in ornaments or wealth, but rather in virtuous behaviour and true understanding.”  Baha’u’llah One of the important aspects of transformation work is the ability to …

Day 10: Projecting Yourself into the Future with the New Virtue

“Consider not the present condition, but rather foresee the future and the end. A seed in the beginning is very small, but in the end a great tree. One should not consider the seed, but the tree and its abundance of blossoms, leaves and fruits.”     (Abdu’l-Baha, Baha’i World Faith – Abdu’l-Baha Section, p. 410) …

Day 8: The Mother of All Fears

“Ye were created to show love one to another and not perversity and rancour. Take pride not in love for yourselves but in love for your fellow-creatures. Glory not in love for your country, but in love for all mankind.”  Baha’u’llah Sometimes good ideas like having 19 consecutive days of doing this transformation plan run …

Day 6: Identity and Ego/True Self States

Dost thou reckon thyself only a puny form When within thee the universe is folded?   Ali quoted in Seven Valleys The word identity in a transformational context means that you so experience and  act on the energy of a particular virtue that you and others start referring to you as a person with that quality …

Day 5: Dealing with the Ego

“Let them at all times concern themselves with doing a kindly thing for one of their fellows, offering to someone love, consideration, thoughtful help. Let them see no one as their enemy, or as wishing them ill, but think of all humankind as their friends; regarding the alien as an intimate, the stranger as a …

Day 4: Listening to the Spirit Within

“So far as ye are able, ignite a candle of love in every meeting, and with tenderness rejoice and cheer ye every heart.”    Abdu’l Baha One of the first keys to any transformation experience is the ability to have a positive experience and then remember it.    Because of the way the world is often …

Day 3: Connecting to Positive Energy

“And be ye not like those who forget God, and whom He hath therefore caused to forget their own selves.”  Baha’u’llah For most people in the Western world and other places God is an angry man in the sky shooting out lightning bolts when people do bad things.   I am really not sure how God …

Day 2: How the Virtue Will Change Your Entire Life

O SON OF BEING! With the hands of power I made thee and with the fingers of strength I created thee; and within thee have I placed the essence of My light. Be thou content with it and seek naught else, for My work is perfect and My command is binding. Question it not, nor …

Day 1: Choosing the Focus of Change

 Let each morn be better than its eve and each morrow richer than its yesterday.  Baha’u’llah Most people, when setting goals for change have the idea that is widely spread throughout the world, that if you want to accomplish something that you need to have a specific target so that you will see it all …

Gifts that Come Naturally v. Gifts that Require Great Efforts

In my other job besides doing dream work I work in the area of physical education with young children between the ages of 5-7.    The other day I was reminded of the principle in the title after meeting with the parents of one of my six year olds.   The student received great evaluations in all …

Crashing Dreams: How to Slow Down, Stop, or Reverse Time

I just had a dream last night that I was driving really fast down a dirt road and I couldn’t slow down so I crashed into a truck and the truck fell over into the ditch with a small stream. I felt really guilty.  When I found a place to pull over and came back …

Anxiety: It Is All an Illusion

Being worried is a very curious emotion.   It doesn’t make very much sense and it is very non-productive.   The other day, after I had been feel anxious at my work,  I began wondering why it suddenly appeared.   I am not normally a very anxious person,  but somehow thoughts started to get into my head which …

If You Want to Develop Something New, You Have to Let Go of Something Old

The old skin has to be shed for the new one to come.  Joseph Campbell Last night we had a gathering in our place which we have each month to explore various topics.   We always have a dinner because the Baha’i Writings state that the spiritual and material worlds should be like a mirror to …

Dreams and Exoricism

Last week someone sent me a dream about exorcising some demonic things from inside of them.   When I work with dreams,  I use two qualities from within myself to help me in the process.  One is the quality of self-discipline and the other is playfulness.    Self-discipline forces me to treat things in a metaphoric manner …

The Critical and Encouraging Voices in Your Head

It would be so great if the voices in our head were encouraging ones like a crowd in a stadium cheering for you or a friend reminding you of all of your positive virtues.    The reality for almost everyone, however, is that that critical voices in our heads are the dominant ones.   They can be …

Why Fathers Abandon Their Posts

For the most part men are still stuck in the Neolithic period acting like Neanderthals.   I am really sorry to say, but it is true.    Men have a code.  Don’t talk about how you are feeling.   Endure all pain without complaint.   Go to war.   Not everyman carries a machine gun,  but when they leave their …

Choosing the Right Goal: Material or Spiritual

Goal setting is a relatively easily process if you know where you are in your life right now.    Most people are driven by what someone else tells them is important which is material in nature such as more money, better sex, a better body, a better house, a faster car, a more beautiful garden, going …

Spiritual Goals versus Material Goals: The Difference is in the Specifics

When you go to most self-help or business sections of a bookstore, you will find that when they talk about setting goals and planning for the future that it is important to be specific, measurable, realistic, etc..   because the brain works best when it has clarity about a target and then goes for it.     This …

The Keys to Dealing with Fear

The first key to being able to overcome fear is to have a friendly, rather than antagonistic relationship with it.    Fear is a universal negative emotion that we all face.   It comes in a lot of varieties.   We all have fear.  It is part of being human.   I think that perhaps future generations will have …