CONNECTION + COMMUNICATION Page 4 of 27

Be your own soul friend today

Posted on 2017-02-14 at 2:19 pm.

Last summer I went to Santa Fe to take a workshop with the very magical Gail Larsen. At the end of it, she invited us to write love letters to each of the people we had shared the workshop with, and to prompt us she played a song which captured the essence of that person. It was a beautiful exercise. When it came to my turn, instead of playing a song, she played a spoken word piece by John O’Donohue, reading aloud a passage from his breathtaking book Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom.

The coincidence didn’t escape me. Just a few weeks before I had discovered the same book by chance when researching my own book Freedom Seeker. In Anam Cara I found a paragraph that was almost word-for-word the same as something Mr K had written in an early love letter many years before, although he had never even heard of Anam Cara. It made my spine tingle.

In Celtic wisdom ‘anam cara’ means ‘soul friend’. It reflects the idea that our souls need love like our bodies need air, and this love can awaken new dimensions of ourselves. According to John O’Donohue in his beautiful book of the same name, an anam cara recognizes the real you without any pretence or disguise. Theirs is a deep spiritual friendship unaffected by geographical distance or time. Your anam cara understands you in a way that makes you feel you belong together, with your destinies intertwined. If you have an anam cara, take good care of that person, as they are precious indeed.

And whether or not you have an anam cara right now, I invite you to be your own. You have to practice self-love on an epic scale to feel truly free. You have to counter the negative voices in your head and hold your own hand through it all. In the end your free self is your greatest ally and truest friend, so treat them well.

This week I challenge you to do something kind for yourself, and be your own anam cara.

Much love

Beth

Strollers, strangers and serendipity (+ meet me in London!)

Posted on 2017-01-26 at 4:54 pm.

Written by Beth Kempton

Last March I got on a train to London, to get myself some inspiration at Hay House’s flagship event ‘Ignite’. It was a fairly straightforward journey – one train ride to Waterloo Station, then a quick hop on the Northern line of the Underground to Euston.

I took along my then eight month old baby in her pushchair, which suddenly seemed like a really bad idea when I realised London Waterloo has a very steep escalator down to the Underground, and no working lift. As I approached the top of the moving stairway wondering how on earth I was going to get us down safely, at the exact same moment three friendly-looking women approached. You know the kind – a small group of friends happily chattering away, all clutching takeaway coffees, with glossy hair and lovely bright clothes, the kind you see and want to be friends with. Yes, three women like that. All three of them turned to me at the same time and said, “You want a hand?” Ahh bless, they were nice as well! “We’re all mums. We know what it’s like.”

And so with a series of swift moves, one was holding all the coffees, one all the handbags and the other two of us holding onto my precious cargo as the steps carried us down into the belly of the Tube.

“You look like you’re having a day out,” I guessed. “Where are you off to?”

“We’re going to an event,” the one with the shiny brown bob said. “Near Euston station.”

“Not ‘Ignite’ by any chance?”

“Yes!” “No way, me too!”

Over 250,000 people pass through Waterloo every day. I met the three who were going to the same place as me, on the other side of the city.

And so we travelled across London together, nattering fast, learning about what each of us did, and why we had all been drawn to ‘Ignite’.

Those lovely ladies were Sam Reynolds, former PA to Daniel Craig, and three-time cancer survivor who runs SamSpaces, a network for people finding their way after cancer, Caroline Udall (founder of The Company of Mums – check out her fab vlog), Jo Ferrone, founder of Wrapped Up Admin (a team of working mums who provide admin, sales & marketing support to small businesses.)

We had much in common and have stayed in touch. In fact, I was so blown away by Sam’s story that I ended up interviewing Sam for my book, Freedom Seeker, and was wholly moved by her strength and light.

And then there was the event itself. I was so inspired by the speakers – all Hay House authors – not just by what they were saying, but the way that they spoke. They told their stories with such power, and touched everyone in the room.

And so it is with so much gratitude and excitement that I can say I’m going to be on that very stage in just a few weeks’ time! Ignite is back and I’m going to be joining six other speakers, many of whom have been a huge inspiration in my personal journey. They are leading lights in the fields of spirituality and personal development – Sonia Choquette, Rebecca Campbell, Carrie Green, Charlie Morley, Sandy Newbigging and Mel Wells. What a day it’s going to be!

I would LOVE to see you there! I’ll be talking all about Freedom Seeking: How to live more, worry less and do what you love. You can register for Ignite 2017 here.

It is in flying free that we fulfil our true potential, and in this talk I’ll reveal how to escape the pressures of modern life, and find the keys to living the life you want. I will share highly relatable and moving personal stories to illustrate the gifts of freedom seeking, and a number of simple but powerful techniques to help you unlock a deep sense of personal freedom. As you begin to use these in your daily life, you will immediately feel more uplifted, happy and free.

The event is on March 18^th, and although it’s a couple of weeks before my book is officially published, rumour has it that there will be early copies for my first ever book signing! Which means, I get to meet YOU and hear about your own journey of freedom seeking too. So if you can be in London on March 18^th, please come, and gift yourself a thought-provoking, perspective-shifting, inspiring day of talks. (PS May I politely suggest you take the Tube to get there, you never know who you might meet…)

You see, it’s all about people. Love and people. Real love and the right kind of people.

Much love,

Beth

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How to make it in the world of… online marketing

Posted on 2017-01-25 at 8:55 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

Drive traffic with these five killer social media hacks

As entrepreneurs we can often feel like the deck is stacked against us when it comes to the digital world. We don’t have the same budgets as our massive competitors, nor do we have the army of marketers that they can employ. So how can a small, or medium-sized business, drive traffic to its website or blog and carve out its piece of the market?

According to Payman Taei, an avid technologist and the founder of Visme and HindSite, the answer lies with social media. Here he shares a whole host of straight-to-the-point, actionable social media tips for marketers and business owners. While some of these strategies won’t be a quick fix, you may be surprised how quickly many of them start to generate results…

Image credit: Wilfred Iven | StockSnap.io

We use social media all the time; on our way to work, in our downtime, even early mornings. Naturally, businesses can take advantage of this; having your own Facebook page or Twitter feed can increase interest in your company and boost user interaction but as with all things, it’s not that simple. With all the different pages out there, it can be quite difficult to make yours stand out. These easy-to-follow social media hacks can help you gain — and keep — new followers, as well as spreading word about your product around the web.

Consistent Updates

Having high-quality updates is obviously a priority for any business. However, if those updates are few and far between, people will likely lose interest in the product.

Updating often is obviously a great way to generate interest and make sure your name and product is remembered, but you can easily go further than that.

Having specific days or times that you post content can help drive traffic, as well as giving potential customers something to look forward to. If posts are always made on a certain day or at a certain time, then followers will get into the habit of checking your social media to see if anything new has appeared, creating a more dedicated base.

What days and times you chose depends on your audience. If your audience is mostly made of standard shift workers, then try updating in the afternoon on weekdays, when they’ll just be getting home and wanting to spend more time on social media. Want to appeal to teenagers and young adults? Try mornings on the weekends, where they won’t have classes and will have more time to look at their feed upon waking up.

Scheduling when to post doesn’t have to be particularly rigid, either, as you can post a few random updates between the normal to surprise and delight your watchers.

Take it one step further: Using missinglettr

Ian Anderson Gray — as shared by Lisa D. Jenkins — provides a helpful tip for those who have trouble finding the time to schedule posts. “I used to create a series of tweets for each of my articles and schedule them in a scheduling tool,” he states. “This took a huge amount of time and to be honest, I rarely managed to get around to it.”

With the help of missingletr, Gray’s work is significantly decreased, while he still gets the benefits of consistent Twitter posts. Missinglettr creates several posts based on the content in an article connected to it. You can use the application to your advantage by allowing it to make several posts for you while you focus on other aspects of your work.

2. Maximize Your Use of Visual Content

It’s no secret that visual content attracts a potential follower’s attention quicker than text. While scrolling on Facebook, which are you more likely to scroll back to: a block of words, or a vibrant image?

Mastering visual content on social media can greatly increase traffic to your page, especially since users are significantly more likely to share pictures or videos.

A great way to use visuals in social media is to take a picture. Jay Baer points out that the use of photographs as visuals has greatly increased, and it provides a wonderful opportunity to show your product in action. Images of people using your product in real-life can increase viewers’ interest in the item. You can also create your own graphic for social media using an online visual tool such as Visme.

Take it Further: Link to Your Site

Since one of the purposes of adding images is to generate traffic, it’d be remiss not to leave a link with the image—or, if possible, make the image itself into a link.

Donna Moritz, in an article by Cindy King, points out how useful visual content can be as a “gateway” to the rest of your business world. Let the visual content catch interest, and leave longer posts to the site they lead to.

3. Master Hashtags

Hashtags first started with Twitter, and have quickly become one of the best ways to locate a specific sort of information. Businesses can benefit from this across social media by using them to their fullest extent.

Jumping on popular subjects to tag is a great way to attract outside attention. All the same, Peg Fitzpatrick warns that having a variety of random hashtags isn’t advisable, even if those tags are trending. “Use a good hashtag to tie all of the pieces of your campaign together,” she informs readers.

Using hashtags strategically — by tagging relevant popular items without random extraneous bits — can not only attract attention, but keep it.

Take it Further: Make Your Own

Having a unique hashtag can distinguish you from others who might have a similar product. Your audience will quickly be able to identify your brand from your tag, and will be able to tag experiences related to your company in turn.

One of the best ways to go about this is to create a short, easy-to-remember tag that sticks in people’s minds long after they log off. Clever use of alliteration or wordplay are great ways to go about this.

5. Engage Your Followers

Actively encouraging your audience to participate can not only help generate traffic, but can also be a way to endear you audience to you.

Showcasing the work of fans or followers automatically makes them more invested in talking about your product. For example, you might want to share posts you see when someone talks positively about your product.

Promoting contests is a great way to go about this. Offering a reward means that more individuals will be talking about your product and generally vying to get the prize. At visme we created a socially engaging contest called “Visualize Me” which was a perfect example of social engagement driven by an incentive.

Of course, taking the time to personally respond to those subscribed to your page can increase engagement, as well.

Take it one step further: Offer Private Streams

Many individuals would like to have personal relationships with the companies that provide for them. Having private boards or groups where you can converse with your customers is one way to provide that relationship.

Many Patreon users have taken this into account. The site has different reward tiers based on how much a patron pledges users each month. In turn, the owner of the individual campaign can offer specific incentives, one of which can be private streams where patrons can watch them work, or Q&As only available for pledges.

Of course, you don’t have to use Patreon to provide the same feature. Martin Shervington talks about having private hangouts on Google+, where you can talk individually to those invited to join. If you’re a Pinterest user, you can also use group boards to your advantage.

You can even combine private conversations with contests. Whoever wins for the company will get a private audience with different members.

5. Make a Safe Space

If followers appreciate having their work and words shown off, then they’ll be equally appreciative of having a space where they don’t have to worry about being looked down on for their opinions. Keeping watch over your social media to make sure everyone’s getting along can not only foster trust and appreciation for your company, but also make others more likely to visit your page and be honest with you. With how aggressive parts of the internet can be, it can be an immense relief to find anywhere that’s decidedly not.

Speaking to individual on a personal basis — as mentioned above — and answering them politely and with general concern is one way to help users feel more welcome.

Another great way — for Facebook, at least — is to ban inflammatory words. Holly Homer describes how to do this: simply go to Page Settings, Page Moderation, and type in any words that could be used to insult or attack another user. Any comments with those words will be hidden, preventing arguments before they happen.

This can also work for provocative comments towards your product or service, as well, if you’re worried about the words blowing up into a full-blown fight.

Take it one step further: Hide the Trolls

Guy Kawasaki explains his trouble with trolls on his Facebook feed — deleting the comment simply resulted in the trolls commenting again to complain about it, while banning the user resulted in angry emails about being banned.

The solution to the problem was actually relatively simple: hide the comment.

When comments are hidden, the posting individual can still see their comment, but no other fans can. Kawasaki explains how this works to his favor; not only has he not received any more angry emails, but the comments, even though they’re hidden, actually help to boost his post, meaning the trolls actually end up helping.

While using the word ban hack (mentioned above) can help for specific words, it also helps to search through comments and check for any other sort of inflammatory remark.

You can take this ‘safe space’ even further by talking to the individual’s specifically and trying to allay any complaints or concerns, but simply moving the conversation to a more private medium. Of course, with spam comments, you’re probably better off just hiding the comment and leaving the conversation.

To Recap

There are many, many different tips and tricks you can use to help boost your social media success. Some of the best include:

Consistent Updates
Mastering Visual Content
Mastering Hashtags
Engaging Users
Making a Safe Space

Here’s a challenge: take these hacks (or others) and try and twist them into something unique. Then, post the results in our comments section, to let us (and others!) know how you’ve put these tricks into action.

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About Payman Taei
Payman is an avid technologist and the Founder of Visme, a Do It Yourself platform allowing everyone to easily create, manage professional presentations & infographics right in their browser. He’s also the Founder of HindSite Interactive an award winning web design and web development company.

Meet the courageous lady who is seeing beauty in response to losing her sight

Posted on 2017-01-10 at 8:55 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

Today we meet the inspirational Kate Morell from Wagga Wagga, Australia. Kate is a talented graphic designer, and a mother-of-two. She also has Usher Syndrome, the most common genetic cause of combined deafness and blindness, which affects over 400,000 people worldwide. She took the Do What You Love course last October, and we were so touched and inspired by her story that we asked her to share it…

A true inspiration… the lovely Kate Morell

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How to publish your book

Posted on 2016-12-13 at 8:55 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

This is a guest post by Alastair Humphreys. Alastair is an adventurer, blogger, author and motivational speaker whose expeditions have included cycling round the world, walking across India and rowing the Atlantic. Alastair was named as a National Geographic Adventurer of the Year for his pioneering work on the concept of micro adventures. He has also written five books about his adventures. Find out more here.

I get asked regularly about how to publish a book, and whether it is best to find a publisher or to self-publish your story.

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Give yourself the gift of self-love this season

Posted on 2016-12-07 at 8:55 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

This post is written by our Senior editor, Rachel Kempton.

“When I loved myself enough, I began leaving whatever wasn’t healthy. This meant people, jobs, my own beliefs and habits…anything that kept me small. My judgment called it disloyal. Now I see it as self-loving.” ~ Kim McMillen

A few days ago one of my friends reminded me that “You cannot pour from an empty jug” and it rang so true. How can you possibly take proper care of the people around you if you’re not taking good care of yourself?

Her wise words got me thinking about the importance of self-love and how it really is key to living a present, positive and happy life. After all, self-love is a state of appreciation for yourself that grows from doing things that support your physical, psychological and spiritual growth.

Of course self-love also requires self-respect – an acceptance of who you are. And there may be times in life when we find ourselves making poor decisions, facing difficult situations, or being so influenced by outside circumstances, that we act out of neither self-love nor self-respect. For example, are you loving and respecting yourself if, as a working mum, you constantly put everyone else’s needs first and burn out? Are you loving and respecting yourself if you have a “successful” career that is making you unhappy or depressed? Are you loving and respecting yourself if you’re constantly being swayed by what you should do rather than what feels right? Or, are you loving and respecting yourself if you put up with the boss who is treating you badly? The answer is, probably not.

While you can’t always control external circumstances, and how others might think, feel, or act, you can control your own mind, your own body and your own soul. You can try and be more conscious about how you treat yourself.

Here are some things that can help you make self-love and respect a priority in your life:

Forgive yourself. We can be so hard on ourselves. The downside of taking responsibility for our actions is punishing ourselves too much for making mistakes as we learn and grow. Accept that no one is perfect and practice being less hard on yourself when you make a mistake. Remember, there are no failures, only lessons learned.

Set boundaries and be honest with yourself, and others. You’ll love yourself more when you set limits or say no to work, love, or activities that deplete or harm you physically, emotionally and spiritually, or express poorly who you are.

Nourish your body. Give your body the nurturing, rest, exercise, and comfort it needs to the best it can be, after all it’s the only place you have to live! Set your intentions by writing a commitment letter to your body, telling it how you intend to love and accept it unconditionally, and practice self-care habits that support its thriving. For example:

Dear dedicated body,

From this moment forward, I promise to feed you with healthy, clean food and positive thoughts. I will water you often. I’ll cherish the spirit you so tirelessly protect and take time out to rest. I’ll strive to understand you, to exercise and inspire your mind so that I may serve you into your old age. From this moment on, I will trust that you are the perfect vehicle for my journey through life. From this moment on, we are a team and I will repay your best with my best.

With love, respect and deepest gratitude, Me xxx

Speak positively about yourself. Judgmental voices from the past may have left a hidden residue of toxic shame, which blocks us from honouring — or even noticing – what we’re really feeling. Being gentle with ourselves means accepting the feelings that arise within us. It is normal to feel sad, hurt, and afraid sometimes. It’s a sign of strength, not weakness, to become mindful of these feelings and allow a friendly space for them.
Follow your intuition. Instead of living out of your brain and ego, follow your heart.
Don’t settle for less than you deserve. Get in touch with who you really are. Ask yourself: how do I want to feel in my every day life? What do I really want? What are my core values and beliefs? Who/what matters most to me? If you’d love help figuring all this out, take our life-changing Do What You Love course.

Our thought-provoking course will help you start building a life that you love now by:

– Doing what you love, more often. Very often. In fact: daily.

– Getting paid to do what you love. (If that’s what you want — for some, it’s not. For many, it is!)

– Making your life simpler and sweeter — not busier and more complicated.

– Re-opening doors that you thought were locked shut… re-opening possibilities that you thought were long gone… and illuminating possibilities you never knew existed.

Self-love: it’s all about what’s inside

No one else can do these things for us. No one can take our vitamin pills for us, or make us speak our truth, or force us to choose the path that brings most joy. Even if we have the best partner/most loving family/most supportive friends in the world, we won’t feel happy and whole unless we create the space for it inside by practicing self-love and respect.

What do self-love and self-respect mean to you? We’d love to know! Please share your thoughts in the comments below.

Back home and over £55,000 raised!

Posted on 2016-12-06 at 8:55 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

This is our final guest post from Claire Le Hur who has just returned from an epic cycling adventure to China with her fiancé Stuart Block. The couple started their adventure in East Africa, where they followed new ‘silk roads’ to chart the journey of key natural resources as part of an exciting new education project. Claire rode a bamboo bike built by an African social enterprise, and Stuart rode a tandem, keeping the back seat free for those they met en route. They have now raised awareness and thousands of pounds for two great educational charities. Find out more about Claire’s big adventure here.

We got back to the UK on a very cold and grey day, and the next day was Brexit and all the ensuing madness: a political revolution in London, or just more of the same on (super) fast-forward? For anyone who hasn’t seen it, you can read Stuart’s blog post from a year ago here. He wrote it as we were leaving London for our adventure and he proved remarkably prescient when he predicted a ‘bloodbath in the corridors of Westmister’.

We were starting to wonder why we had bothered to come back to England, so to take our minds off things we got back on our bikes and made sure we cycled the full 11,000km we were aiming for (we reached 10,000km in Hong Kong.) We did our own version of the ‘London Revolution’, cycling around the M25 (or a few miles outside it!), visiting schools and friends along the way.

Our route took us to several schools in Surrey, Cambridge and London as well as two days at the Telegraph/Wellington Festival of Education at Wellington College. At Wellington we addressed teachers on ‘how to bring an adventure into the classroom’ and students on ‘Overseas Aid; Who Benefits’. We were delighted to have a photo call with renowned philosopher, A. C. Grayling.

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Do What You Love interview – Charlie Morley

Posted on 2016-11-23 at 8:55 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

Did you know that on average we sleep for one-third of our lives? That’s a whole lot of time spent in dreamland! So what if we could use some of this time to not only have fun, but to transform how we experience the world and who we are? Well, according to lucid dreaming expert Charlie Morley, we can do just that. How? By simply bringing mindful awareness into all stages of our dream, sleep and waking life.

Charlie has been lucid dreaming since his teens but he only began teaching it about six years ago through a holistic approach to lucid dreaming within the context of mindfulness meditation and Tibetan Buddhism, Mindfulness of Dream & Sleep, which he co-founded. Charlie passionately believes that anyone can learn how to become conscious within their dreams and he’s living proof that doing so can change be life-changing.

Charlie now spends his time travelling the world running workshops and retreats and giving talks based on his books Dreams of Awakening and Lucid Dreaming: A Beginners Guide to help people on the path to spiritual and psychological awakening. I just had to talk to him to find out how we can all open ourselves up to a world of limitless possibilities… without even getting out of bed! ~ Rachel

1. First of all, for those who’ve never heard of it, can you tell us exactly what lucid dreaming is?

Lucid dreaming is the art of becoming conscious within your dreams. A lucid dream is one in which you think, a-ha, I’m dreaming! while you’re still asleep. Once you become conscious within a dream, you can interact with and direct it at will, dancing with your unconscious mind. With practice, you can have lucid dreams of an hour in length. Imagine spending an hour inside your own mind: think of what you could do; what you could explore; the people you could meet: aspects of yourself, your higher self, guides. And remember, everyone you meet in the lucid dream is you – they are reflections of you, your own consciousness. In a lucid dream if I meet an elderly African woman, I’m meeting an aspect of my own femininity, an aspect of my own age-old wisdom, and an aspect of my own ideas and energy of Africa. So it’s a fascinating way to gain insight into yourself – and particularly into aspects of yourself that normally remain hidden because in our waking state we have filters. We can suppress things. When we go to sleep all this content can come up. A lucid dream shows that this content is you – the good, the bad and the ugly. The key is to show love towards everyone – all parts of you – in your dream.

2. How long have you been lucid dreaming?

When I was a kid I was scared of monsters under the bed so I didn’t want to wake up and use the toilet when I needed to pee. I remember the feeling of a full bladder seeping into the dream and making me become fully lucid. Then, from within the dream, I would think to myself: I really don’t want to get out of bed to pee. Maybe I’ll just do it while I’m still in the dream?

Then I kind of forgot about it all but then when I was 17, I bought some books and taught myself how to do it and I started having regular lucid dreams. I found that I had gained access to a virtual reality of incredible realism in which social norms didn’t apply. Not yet aware of the Tibetan Buddhist lucid dream practices that I now teach, and at the peak of my wild teenage years, I didn’t view the lucid dream state as a potential training ground for enlightened action. I saw it purely as a place to get laid! So it was just for having fun first but then when I got into Buddhism a couple of years later I started to use it for more beneficial stuff.

3. What kind of healing work can we do on ourselves in a lucid dream?

Lucid dreaming can offer some really powerful opportunities to unpack, accept and heal our baggage within the dream state.

Let’s say you’re scared of spiders? Gradual exposure to spiders within the lucid dream can be used to help overcome a phobia of them in a similar way to cognitive behavioural therapy. By engaging fearlessly with the source of a phobia (whether it’s spiders or anything else) within the lucid dream – while holding in mind that it’s all a mental projection – sufferers can begin to gradually integrate the phobia. I’ve worked with people who’ve all used their lucid dreams to heal all sorts of things. One man used his lucid dreams to explore his sexual behaviour – by meeting a dream character who told him he was ‘the physical manifestation of your fear of commitment’, while a young woman used her lucid dream to meet and forgive the memory of the abuser from her childhood. This potential for healing is one of the deepest benefits of the practice.

4. Why does lucid dream training wake us up to the real beauty of life and help us become more mindful of the way we think, feel and behave?

Through learning to dream lucidly, we can learn to live lucidly and wake up to life. Every time we lucid dream we are experiencing a new perception of reality, one in which we are the co-creator, and the more we experience this, the more we may also perceive waking reality in a similar way. Each time we do this we are creating a habit of recognition. It is this habit of seeing through illusion that forms the crux of lucid living.

Lucid dreamers naturally begin to take charge of their waking life in much the same way as they do in their dreams. Empowered by the experiences of their lucid dreams, they strive consciously to direct and co-create their waking lives, too. They become more positive, proactive and discerningly optimistic in their waking interactions.

In his first book, Dreams of Awakening, Charlie says that while 99 per cent of what we experience in a lucid dream is our own unconscious, there’s always room for other possibilities. “If you think of the classic iceberg description of the mind that Freud popularized, it’s as if when you go into a lucid dream, you go into the depths of your personal iceberg, which is normally hidden below water,” he explains. “But you also might move to the edge of the iceberg, or even into the sea surrounding the iceberg, and this might be exploring the edges of the collective unconscious, or even interacting with the universal mind.”

5. Why is practicing compassionate motivation in our lucid dreams, and in reality, the key to manifesting what we really want in this life?

Because this is a compassionate universe and so the universe responds to compassionate motivation. Do something for others and it will manifest way more easily than doing something just for yourself. That’s how karma works in fact too.

6. Can we all get lucid and how do we do it? Is there a step-by-step guide to follow or will having the right intention, and lots of enthusiasm, be enough to make it happen?

Yeah there a step by step guide by which anybody can teach themselves how to do it. Intention and enthusiasm are key but without the correct techniques they may not be enough. My books and online courses are pretty good at teaching people. And yes that was a shameless plug.

7. Is it easy to get confused between reality and the lucid dream state? What checks can we do in the reality state to check that we aren’t lucid dreaming?

Some people worry that lucid dreamers stand to lose touch with what’s real but in fact quite the opposite happens. Once we can see through the hallucinatory reality of the dreamscape, and know it as illusion, we become better

equipped to recognize illusion in the waking state. This makes us more mentally stable and self-aware.

Reality checks, ways of telling if you are dreaming or awake (in the dream it can be a bit confusing) are used by lucid dreamers to become lucid and so in fact nobody knows the difference between reality and dream better than a lucid dreamer because becoming lucid depends upon it!

8. What is the most amazing things that’s happened to you in a lucid dream and did it affect your life?

Oh god, we could be here all day with this one but some of the standout moments where healing my eye sight, curing my nightmares, communicating with someone who had recently died, precognitive possibility and being able to meet both my internal Jesus and the Devil in lucid dreams. Both of them were embraced equally!

9. You have many amazing teachers. Who are you looking to right now and what lessons have you learned most recently?

Ok so here’s an exclusive for you because I just revved this teaching today. I bought my teacher Lama Yeshe Rinpoche a Nutibullet so that he could wizz up his nettles for his nettle soup: the only thing he eats during his annual 3 month retreat. This morning he sent me a thank you e mail with the following teaching in it: “always remain joyful and humble. No hope of achieving anything, no fear of losing anything and being kind, honest and true will bring you good benefit.”

10. You are truly doing what you love. How did your lucid dreams guide you towards teaching, writing and speaking – and reassure you that helping others is your true calling?

I actually asked the lucid dream “what should I do with my life?” I literally yelled it out in a lucid dream about seven years ago. The dream then presented me with all these dream characters who told me to do the lucid dream teaching full time. I just took their advice.

11. What’s your ultimate goal?

It’s the same as the poet Patti Smith’s actually: “My mission is to communicate. To wake people up. To give them my energy and to accept theirs. We are all in this together.”

12. How can we all use lucid dreaming to take us closer to doing what we love?

Lucid dreaming will show your highest potential and can also be used to ask for advice on how you can manifest that highest potential. Follow your dreams, they know the way.

13. Finally can you share your tips for helping your mind move towards the lucid dreaming state?

Before you go to sleep, ask ‘may my dreams guide me to…’
Keep a dream diary to help you recall your dreams and get to know the territory of them. Eventually you’ll begin to recognize that territory when you’re in it, and know when you’re in a dream.
Reality check during your day – ask yourself ‘what would I like to be dreaming about right now?’
Before you go to sleep, hold the intention of being lucid by saying: “Tonight I recognize my dreams. Tonight I am lucid in my dreams.”

For more information about Lucid Dreaming, watch Charlie’s TED talk at the San Diego TEDx conference, below:

For more information about Charlie and his work, visit his website, YouTube or connect on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

FOLLOW YOUR DREAMS AND DO WHAT YOU LOVE

What is it you really want? The courage to start a new career? The time to pursue passions and hobbies? The freedom to travel and have big adventures? Or simply to “feel differently” about your life, just as it is? All of those wants — and so many others — stem from one big desire… you love. The desire to do what

And if that’s what you want, you’ve arrived in the best possible place you can be. This is your launchpad — and this is your community. And this online course might just change your life.

Do What You Love is an acclaimed course for people who want to spend more time doing what they love and less time doing what they don’t. Simple as that. It’s about finding freedom and building the life you really want.

You can find out more about our life-changing Do What You Love e-course, or sign up, HERE.

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If ever the world needed your brave heart, it is now

Posted on 2016-11-10 at 3:29 pm.

Written by Beth Kempton

Half of America and much of the world is grieving today, devastated about the future they had hoped for, which will no longer be. Our collective trajectory has shifted, but that doesn’t mean we are powerless to shape our own futures.

A couple of weeks ago I gave a talk in New York City on ‘How to talk to anyone’. It was a lesson in speaking from your brave heart, and now, more than ever, I want you to hear this. Now, more than ever, we need to be speaking from our brave hearts, and recognising the brave hearts in others. And teaching our children to speak from their brave little hearts too.

I hope this talk lifts you in these uncertain times. If you know anyone else who needs to hear this, please feel free to share it on social media using this link: https://bit.ly/2eW4wMc

Beth

By the book… The Power of Now

Posted on 2016-10-28 at 8:55 am.

Written by Beth Kempton

This month we read (and loved!) The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle… by Senior Editor, Rachel Kempton

Do you ever feel like you’re on a hamster wheel running at top speed but not getting anywhere? The last few months have felt a bit like that for me: the constant to-ing and fro-ing between work, family and friends; a diary packed with social commitments and obligations; and a never-ending to-do list — not to mention the incessant pings from my phone — have left me longing for some time out.

A couple of days away, and an eye-opening book later, I’d discovered where I’ve been going wrong. Not only have I been physically busy, my mind has been in overdrive too — constantly racing from one thought to the next instead of being more present.

Eckhart Tolle’s book, The Power of Now, was a timely reminder that the key to experiencing more joy in life lies simply in the here and the now. The insights I’ve gleaned from this book have been swirling about in my consciousness for the last couple of weeks. It has completely changed the way I think, act and feel.

Here are my top three takeaways:

1. The moment is all I have

The basic principle of the book is that we don’t exist outside the Now and [Tweet “living in the now is the truest path to happiness and enlightenment.”]

At first I found this concept quite tricky to grasp as I’ve always thought of life as a line that takes us from birth to death with the present moment being a single point which moves slowly forward along it. The Power of Now shares the idea that there is no line and no defining past and future points. That the present is all we have. And that the past (which gives us identity) and future (which holds the promise of fulfilment in any form) are mere illusions which we create by imagining them in the present.

And it makes complete sense. Constantly looking ahead to the next big thing — whether it’s an event, a goal, or a dreams of a better future — and trying to control other people, situations and outcomes in the process is both stressful and draining. On the other hand when you can consciously offer no resistance to what is and allow the present moment to be just as it is, good or bad, you feel immense calm and inner peace.

2. I am not my mind

Now I try and see my mind as independent. Yes I see the thoughts racing around in there but the difference is that I know I don’t need to engage with them or react to them. Instead I do my best to stand aside, watch, and laugh at how ridiculous they are! Just knowing that they don’t define who I am or how I live my life feels incredibly liberating.

3. Problems don’t exist

Tolle explains our ‘life situation’ is not our ‘life’. Our ‘life situation’ is stuff we need to resolve, chores to attend to and relationships that need attention. But when we’ve taken care of that, we can come back to our ‘life’, our essence, our true nature and leave behind the deadening nature of ‘time created problems’ which are just a manifestation of an over busy mind.

The fact is that as long as we define ourselves in terms of our pains and problems we will never be free from them. Now I’m taking the view that unless I’m being chased by a bear, or I find myself in another potentially life-threatening situation, I actually don’t have any problems so I may as well stop worrying.

The Power of Now has helped to free me from the mind-numbing thoughts that have make me feel confused, stressed and exhausted. Yes, it takes a great deal of effort to be more consciously aware in every part of your life but the trade-off for feeling lighter and brighter is totally worth it.

Check out this animation by The Journey which explains more about all this…

About the author and the book

Eckhart Tolle wrote The Power of Now following a cataclysmic spiritual experience that he claims erased his former identity when he was 29. One evening, he was a near-suicidal graduate student, living in a Belsize Park bedsit; by the following morning, he’d been flooded with a sense of “uninterrupted deep peace and bliss” that has never left him since. That morning, he writes, “I walked around the city in utter amazement at the miracle of life on earth, as if I had just been born.”

Following his epiphany, Tolle has become one of the most successful spiritual author of the modern age, and Oprah Winfrey, whose championing of his books included a 10-week online seminar series watched by 11 million people, has ensured their long-term tenure on bestseller lists on both sides of the Atlantic.

You can order The Power Of Now via Amazon.uk and Amazon.com.