Table of Contents
Table of Contents
1. Introduction 6
2. What is Stress 9
2.1 How Prolonged Stress Effects Your Body. 11
3. Spiritual and Natural Laws 14
3.1 Spiritual Laws for Stress management 15
4. The Law of Non-Resistance 17
4.1 Life has its Ups and Downs 17
4.2 Life Simply Is. 19
4.3 Dangers of Positive Thinking 21
4.4 Dealing with Tragedy 23
5. Law of Choice 26
5.1 Perceived Lack of Choice 26
5.2 Choice versus Reaction 28
5.3 Applying the Law of Choice 29
6. Law of Dualities 32
6.1 A World of Opposites 32
7. Law of present moment 35
7.1 The ‘what if’ game 35
7.2 Worrying does not Equal Caring 37
7.3 The Past and the Future 38
7.4 Being Here and Now 42
7.5 Applying the Law of the Present Moment 44
7.5.1 Meditation 45
7.5.2 Active Meditation 47
7.5.3 What to do if You have a Pressing Problem 49
8. Law of Non-Judgment 50
8.1 Two Sides to Every Story 51
8.2 Reactive Judgment 52
8.3 Self-Judgment 54
8.4 Applying the Law of Non-Judgment 55
9. Law of Expectations 57
9.1 Giving to Receive 59
9.2 Beware of the Word ‘SHOULD’ 61
9.3 Don’t Expect Habitual Behavior of Others to Change 64
9.4 Applying the Law of Expectations 65
10. Law of Cause and Effect 66
10.1 Applying the Law of Cause and Effect 69
11. Law of Attention 70
11.1 Put Your Attention on the Solution 76
11.2 Keep Your Mind Focused On What You Want 77
11.3 Applying the Law of Attention 78
12. Law of Purpose and Law of Passion 80
12.1 Finding your Purpose 82
12.2 Following your passion and purpose 85
12.3 Applying the Law of Purpose and Passion. 90
13. Law of Honesty 91
13.1 Justification and Blame 91
13.2 Self-honesty 93
13.3 Applying the Law of Honesty 96
14. Conclusion 97
Extract
(part of) Chapter 11. Law of Attention
The Law of Attention is one of the most important for overcoming undue stress in your life.
The law of attention states that: what we put attention on will grow. A child given attention will grow and thrive, whereas a child that is ignored can either play up to get attention (either positive or negative because negative attention is better than no attention at all) or can become withdrawn and lifeless.
If we put our attention on our problems and the negative aspects of our lives, these will grow. If we tell ourselves how stressed we are, then we will become more stressed.
This law lets us know that we can be our own worst enemy or best friend, and the only difference is where we choose to place our attention.
Our minds seem to have the habit of bringing up similar experiences to those we are now having. If we are in a car accident we will automatically remember all other car accidents we have ever been in or maybe ones that we have seen. Or if our partner tells us they are leaving we will automatically remember other times that we have been left. This will do nothing but add to our current pain and make us feel even worse.
When our mind starts a trip down memory lane like this, we can actually talk ourselves into becoming stressed or even depressed. It can be fascinating to watch you mind at work in this way.
See if you can catch yourself in the process of a negative trip down memory lane, watch yourself become more unhappy as each thought passes. Then realize that you have just done this to yourself and you did not have to.
Okay here is an example. Say you have met a new man and he has promised to call on Tuesday night. Tuesday comes and you are all nervous and excite; What will you say? Will the conversation go well? Will he ask you out? etc.
He is meant to call at 8pm. By 5 to 8 your stomach is full of butterflies and you’re making sure no one is on the phone or internet.
At 8 o’clock you are staring anxiously at the phone.
5 past 8 and he hasn’t called and that is when you start talking to yourself
“Maybe his watch is late”,
10 past 8 “ Maybe his phone battery is dead”,
15 past 8 “he’s not going to call”
20 past 8 “he was never going to call, he just said that to get rid of me” –
(Now the self talk is starting to get into dangerous territory and it is only a few thoughts short of self-pity and possibly depression and a tub of chocolate ice-cream).
8:30pm “Why do men always do this? – they say they will call and never do, it is so rude and inconsiderate, I would never do anything like that. ”
Then we go down a step further
“This always happens to me, I meet someone, I start to like them and then never hear from them again. I really liked that guy I met on the train, I was so sure we had hit it off and he really liked me but I never heard from him again, and then there was Kathy’s friend Tony, he was so hot, but after that one date he was suddenly too busy” etc.
And then finally
“What is wrong with me, men never like me, if he liked me he would have made sure he called on time; I’m never going to find a partner; I’ll probably never go out on another date in my life; I’m going to be alone and miserable for the rest of my life; Why won’t someone love me? What is wrong with me?. I’m a good person, all I want is the chance to love someone and be loved – is that asking too much? Why is life so unfair? Why is my life so awful? That’s it I am never talking to another man again in my life, what’s the point? How much ice-cream do we have in the fridge?”
When we are in this state, we are totally focused on our negative past experiences, we forgot all the good times that we have had, and we see our life only in terms of how bad it has been.
We feel justified in blaming the man for making us feel so miserable, but we have actually talked ourselves into feeling this way.
If we had control over our thoughts then we would not go to bed feeling sick because we ate so much ice- cream, and miserable, because we think we are going to live a lonely and miserable life.
Instead of letting our minds rage out of control, we could have just stuck to facts. We may have still felt a little disappointed but not totally devastated.
The facts are:-
We thought we were going to get a phone call from a certain person and that person did not call. That is all that actually happened, the rest we have made up in our minds.
We could have just said to ourselves, “I was really looking forward to his call and I am disappointed that he didn’t call. Maybe he got held up and if so he will call me later, or maybe he didn’t feel as strongly about me as I did about him. Oh well, I am not going to let what someone else thinks upset my night or life. Instead I will treat myself to a nice bath with a good book and if he calls later great, and if not there are more fish in the sea”. Then let it go and go and do something positive and enjoyable. So if he does call later you will be relaxed and happy to hear from him and not annoyed and defensive.
It all comes down to choice and attention. We can choose not to let our minds dwell on the negative. I know that it sounds a lot easier than it is – but all it takes is determination, awareness and practice. The first step is to become aware of what you are saying to yourself, just watch it with interest as you would watch a movie.
Next, recognize that you have a choice between allowing your mind to go down the emotional path or simply stick to the facts. Sometimes you will choose to let your mind go wild, and that is fine: get in their and wallow well. If you are going to do something do it well.
At other times, you will catch yourself and decide that you do not want to make yourself feel miserable today. The more you make this choice the easier it will become, and you will find that you are spending less and less time feeling stressed and sorry for yourself.
With an untrained mind, it can be very difficult to keep our attention off the negative. It is such a strong habit, just letting our minds go where they want to. But as you can see from the above example, our mind makes a dreadful master: it can take us to the dregs of our life and experiences. When you learn to train your mind you can stop this from happening.
The best way to train your mind is with meditation. Practice meditation daily as an exercise to train your mind to focus. Your mind will then be under your control and not the other way around.
An added bonus to having a well focused mind is that you will be able to concentrate more easily. When you can put your full concentration and focus on something, you will get tasks and chores done much more quickly, and you will not waste so much time with your mind wandering all over the place.
If we spend our time focusing on the negative aspects of life and people, then we give the things we do not like, energy to grow, and we will see more and more negative things around us.
If instead, we put our attention on what we like about people and look for things to be grateful for, then we will find that we have more to be grateful for, and we will be both better company, and enjoy the company of others more.