OK, just bear with me for a bit. Stop reading, close your eyes, and just FEEL for a moment. Are you feeling good? If so, that’s great! Please stop reading this article and go on to the next one in this newsletter. Come back to this point when you are not feeling good. I DARE You!
If you are not feeling emotionally good at the moment, please continue reading. I’m going to ask you to do one very simple little thing, and then stop, check how you are feeling at the moment, and then come back to this article. Is that OK with you? If not, then I DARE You!
Well then, here we go. Please close your eyes, check how you are feeling, and give it a number on a scale from 1 (feeling only a little good) to 10 (feeling very, very good). I’m willing to bet that you aren’t very close to a 10 on this scale, so let’s proceed a little further.
Now, slowly and gently begin to lift the corners of your mouth ever so slightly while observing how you are feeling. Go ahead, little by little lift the corners of your mouth. Feel them lifting – I DARE You! Notice what happens to your emotional state as your cheeks gently begin to tighten and you feel the corners of your mouth lift centimeter by centimeter. This is called a “SMILE”. Stop when you have reached the limit of your comfort zone or when it feels almost too fake to be genuine. Then, check how you are feeling and give it a number on the same scale from 1 to 10. Did your number go up – even a little bit? If not, try repeating this step until you remember what a smile feels like. It doesn’t matter how big or broad your smile is, or even whether your teeth show. The only thing that matters is how you feel. Now relax your face.
I’m willing to bet that most of you made at least some progress in raising your feeling index a little bit. If not, stop right here and come back later after you have read another article or two in this newsletter – if you DARE!
If you did experience feeling a little better, good for you! But that’s the simple part, the easy part. Now comes the hard stuff. Are you ready for the next step? I DARE You!
For this next step, you’ll need a mirror. Any mirror will do – a cosmetic mirror from your purse, your bathroom mirror, your reflection in a bowl of water – just a long as you can clearly see your face. Now, feel yourself slowly and gently begin to lift the corners of your mouth ever so slightly while observing how you are feeling. Give it a number between 1 and 10. Did your feeling index stay about the same, or did watching that face in the mirror smiling back at you raise it? What do you think that face in the mirror is feeling? And does your feeling index change as you are watching that face in the mirror? Does it change even more when you break into a broad, toothy grin? Try it – if you DARE.
Now that wasn’t so bad was it? What makes it hard is the nagging feeling that this is just silly – just playing games – but that is the Self trying to reassert control over your emotional responses. If you really did experience an improvement in your feeling index, rest assured that you are more in alignment with your Higher Self:
• “The way you feel is only ever about your alignment, or misalignment, with the Source within you. It is only your relationship with the Source within you (with your own Inner Being) that is the reason for the emotions that you feel.” ~ Abraham (Collective consciousness of Spirit as channeled by Esther Hicks; Excerpted from Abraham’s Getting into the Vortex Guided Meditation CD and User Guide)
OK, now it’s time to go public. It’s one thing to grin at yourself in your bathroom mirror (you should do this at least twice every day from now on) and quite another to do it where other people can see you. I suggest a shopping trip where you can see your reflection in the store windows. Something about the “forbidden” behavior of doing this on the street is actually a little exciting but, oh, so worth it. You don’t have to make a big production out of it, just look in the glass window, smile, and monitor how you are feeling. Give it a number between 1 and 10. I DARE You!
The purpose of smiling at your own image (especially in public) is to learn not to feel self-conscious, not to feel ashamed or embarrassed by smiling. That sounds a little silly, but why else do people avoid smiling (especially in public)? The purpose is also to prepare you for your next assignment (drum roll . . . . . .), purposely smiling at a stranger as you approach them on the street. Don’t think you can do that? C’mon, I DARE You!
This should be “old hat” to you by now. You should be feeling like a pro at this point! So just do it. You don’t know them and they don’t know you, so what’s to lose? Moreover, what’s to gain? Try it and find out. I DARE You!
There. How did it feel? Kind’a nice, wasn’t it? I’ll bet that the other person either smiled back or looked somewhat shocked and kept walking. If they smiled back, how did it feel (1-10)? If they looked shocked, it was kind of funny, wasn’t it? How did that make you feel?
• “Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.” ~ Thich Nhat Hanh (1926-; Vietnamese Buddhist monk and peace activist)
• “Life is supposed to be fun – it is supposed to feel good! . . . Nothing is more important than that you feel good. Just practice that and watch what happens.” ~ Abraham (Collective consciousness of Spirit as channeled by Esther Hicks; Excerpted from the workshop in North Los Angeles, CA, March 22nd, 2003)
Funny thing about smiling – it can get to be a habit, a very good feeling habit. And when you can find a way to feel good, you are coming closer to aligning your conscious energy with that of your Higher Self, and that’s a good feeling!
• “[Let] your desire for feeling good be your only guiding light. As you seek those thoughts that feel good, you will always be in vibrational harmony with the Energy that is your Source. And under those conditions, only good can come to you – and only good can come from you.” ~ Abraham (Collective consciousness of Spirit as channeled by Esther Hicks; Excerpted from the workshop in Philadelphia, PA, April 14th, 1998)
And it’s all a matter of choice. You can choose to feel good or you can choose to feel bad. And if you aren’t ready to feel good, you can choose to feel better.
• “Being happy is the cornerstone of all that you are! Nothing is more important than that you feel good! And you have absolute and utter control about that because you can choose the thought that makes you worry or the thought that makes you happy; the things that thrill you, or the things that worry you. You have the choice in every moment.” ~ Abraham (Collective consciousness of Spirit as channeled by Esther Hicks; Excerpted from the workshop in Sacramento, CA, March 15th, 2009)
Feeling good is your birthright, so take it (I DARE You!) or leave it – it is your choice.
• “You were born to experience a life with happiness, joy, success, and abundance.” ~ Maitreya (Newsletter #69, March 15, 2003)
• “Face your fears and take the happiness and joy you deserve and which is yours by right.” ~ Maitreya (Newsletter #161, September 3, 2005)
And if you are still stuck back at the stage of looking in a mirror, try this:
• “If you feel that you can’t smile, stand before a mirror and with your fingers pull your mouth into a smile. It is that important!” ~ Paramhansa Yogananda (1893–1952; Indian yogi and guru who introduced many westerners to the teachings of meditation and Kriya Yoga through his book, Autobiography of a Yogi, 1946)
Go on, I DARE You!
• “As you think thoughts that feel good to you, you will be in harmony with who-you-really-are. And in doing so you will utilize your profound freedom. Seek joy first, and all of the growth that you could ever imagine will come joyously and abundantly unto you.” ~ Abraham (Collective consciousness of Spirit as channeled by Esther Hicks; Excerpted from the book Money and the Law of Attraction: Learning to Attract Health, Wealth and Happiness)
• “At the heart of every desire is the desire to feel good. And so, the standard of success in life is not the things or the money, the standard of success is absolutely the amount of joy you feel.” ~ Abraham (Collective consciousness of Spirit as channeled by Esther Hicks; Excerpted from The Teachings of Abraham)
• “It’s really important that you feel good. Because this feeling good is what goes out as a signal into the universe and starts to attract more of itself to you. So the more you can feel good, the more you will attract the things that help you feel good and that will keep bringing you up higher and higher.” ~ Dr. Joe Vitale (Author & speaker)
• “If you smile when no one else is around, you really mean it.” ~ Andy Rooney (1919-2011; American radio & television writer, humorist & political commentator)
Oddly, for many people, it is actually much easier to smile at a stranger than it is to smile at themselves. The reason? Anonymity. A stranger knows nothing about you, but you know everything about yourself – or at least you think you do. If you are like most human beings, you have something about which you are embarrassed or ashamed of for having done or not done as the case may be. You may also have feelings of low self-esteem or low self-worth, often because of guilt foisted upon you by yourself or by others.
• “When you can start learning to love yourself, then God, under whatever name you call this energy can do the work of loving you unconditionally. Until you can love yourself, your negative feelings about yourself will block that love. You have never done anything wrong. You have just taken the wrong road, made the wrong choice, or misused energy. Life is a continual learning experience. If you did not make mistakes – as you on earth call it – you would never learn. There are no mistakes, only choices. . . . Forgive yourselves for anything you have persecuted yourself for and open up to unconditional love!” ~ Maitreya (Channeled by Margaret McElroy, Maitreya Newsletter #309, April 9, 2010)
• “There are no mistakes, only lessons learned from the experience. There should be no shame that one made a wrong choice. This happens every day on the earth plane. Millions make choices which sometimes are not good. But whether good or bad, they are all learning experiences. It is a very highly evolved soul who can forgive another, but an even bigger soul who can forgive oneself. Sometimes the choices one makes hurt another (another source of flagellation of the self). You cannot go back and change anything; nothing can be done to return it to what it was. If this happens, allow yourself forgiveness and move on. So much time and energy is wasted punishing oneself for what one has done.” ~ Maitreya (Channeled by Margaret McElroy, Maitreya Newsletter #220, January 5, 2009)
• “When you are in sync with the Energy of Source, which is the Energy of Well-being, Well-being is your experience. And when you’re not you don’t feel so good. Everything that you’re living is a perfect replica of the vibration of your being.” ~ Abraham (Collective consciousness of Spirit as channeled by Esther Hicks; Excerpted from the workshop in Houston, TX, January 5th, 2002)
• “If you’re not selfish enough to want to feel good, then you can’t connect with the energy that is your Source which does always feel good.” ~ Abraham (Collective consciousness of Spirit as channeled by Esther Hicks; Excerpted from the workshop in Lincroft, NJ, October 15th, 1996)
• “A smile is a curve that sets everything straight.” ~ Phyllis Diller (American comedian)