JOYWORK NOW

The Opportunity

What if you could do only work you love, and pay forward your gratitude with all you do?

Why would you care about expressing gratitude in all that you do? Or feel as if you are paying forward gratitude? This would mean you already have an abundance for which to be grateful. And I would argue that you do, no matter what your current conditions suggest.

And, before we begin on that, 2 other opportunities to consider:

1. What if, from this day forward, you could say, “I’ve always done what brought my soul the greatest joy”? It doesn’t matter if you haven’t done this yesterday, or ever. Today. Starting today, this is what you know about your life. How does that feel?This is what Neale Donald Walsch said about his life in his book Neale Donald Walsch on Abundance and Right Livelihood.
2. He also added, for all of us: “True abundance has nothing to do with anything that I am having, and everything to do with what I am being. And that when I share my abundance of beingness abundantly with all those whose lives I touch, everything I sought to have came to me automatically, without even trying to have them.”

Is that an invitation, or what?

The Practice

 1. LIST. In his Abundance book, Neale invites us to make a list of the things we have in abundance.

Do you have a little Love? Joy? Lightheartedness (Fun/Playfulness)? Generosity of Spirit? Open heartedness?

I taped this list beside the white board in my office. What list will you mount?

 

2. EXPRESS. I love this next part of the exercise because it prompted a breakthrough for me.

I couldn’t figure out why, months later, the experience of howling with the coyote from the mountaintop still had such a hold on me. I’ve been blessed to experience many inspiring moments in my life, what did this represent that I had not yet recognized?

Neale offers this wonderful reflection question in the Abundance book: “What is it I’m being, when I feel totally fulfilled and totally self-expressed?”

“What am I being when that happens? Maybe I’m being a healer, maybe I’m being sensual, maybe I’m being creative. Or there’s some level or state of beingness that would describe to you in a word or two the essence of what’s showing up for you, what part of you that’s really showing up big. And that’s how we find our right doingness. It’s when doingness follows from our beingness, rather than us using doingness to get to beingness.”

I hope you have some answers percolating. Pause, reflect before continuing, if you like. This is a special opportunity for you, if you seize it.

If you’ve taken a moment to reflect, or chosen to return to complete this part of the exercise later, I’ll share now what happened for me:

I realized I was being “One” with the coyote, as mentioned in the post, experiencing “I Am That.”

Yet there was more: I felt abundantly free there. Howling from the mountaintop, with no concern if others heard us what they’d think. I howled from the depths of my soul: with abandon, calling out the Love and connection with this animal that I had previously feared, even considered an “enemy.”  And then I wept heartily when it was over. I felt fully expressed .

And when I reflected on a phrase that I’d been using as shorthand for my best self, the phrase suddenly felt incomplete. There was a rawness, a “paws to the ground” part of me that was not depicted in that description… A feeling of being wild, wide open, raw, visceral, gritty, determined, fierce, that also portrayed my essence when I feel totally self-expressed. I wanted to live into that, too.

See the power of this reflection when you dive into it?

So now, the sheet by my whiteboard says “JoyWork” at the top. You can draw a line down the middle of the page and, on the left side, add: “List of things I have in abundance to share.” On the right side, write “What is it that I’m being, when I feel totally fulfilled and totally self-expressed?” Name your qualities there. Below that, I’ve written the simple words: “While Remembering, the Highest Being is: One,” with an arrow leading to the word…

3. MOVE. Movement that comes from how we have chosen to be is the best, always.

Raw, wide open, “paws to the ground” expresses part of how I choose to be so I, proverbially, follow the coyote up the mountain.

What about you? What ways of being bring you joy, make you feel totally fulfilled and totally self-expressed that you can bring to your studies, work, volunteering, building a business, paving your own way…?

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Jillian (Robinson) Weaver loves sharing stories of the heart – for the joy of it. An Emmy-winning television producer, author-photographer and coach, she hopes these words help kindle the light in your life to burn brighter and is grateful to be with you on this journey.