By Jon Patrick Frieda
Have you ever been inspired into action? Truth be told, all of us have likely been inspired before in our lives. Do you know what inspiration actually is? How would you describe it? Think about that for a moment. Inspiration is actually a process by which we become mentally stimulated to feel or do something, especially to do something creative by using our imagination. Interestingly, inspiration is also defined as the drawing in of breath into your lungs. As we’ve spoken about thoughts, words, actions, moods, temperaments and personality traits in previous articles, it should come as no surprise that all of these factors contribute to our attitudes with regard to people, places, situations and things.
Interested? If so, read on as we highlight and explore the process of inspiration and how you can integrate it into your daily life to begin living more abundantly than ever before. Inspiration has everything to do with emotions and feelings. Emotions are instinctive and intuitive based on our life experiences from an early age onward. A feeling is expressed as an emotional state based on a reaction to a person, place, situation or thing. How do you feel when you first wake up in the morning, throughout the day, and at the end of the day when you lay down to go to sleep? What are the thoughts going through your mind? Do you have mostly good or bad feelings? In short, honestly answering these questions for yourself will reveal if you believe that you can and do live day to day successfully, or if there is resistance keeping you on a most difficult path. The good news is that you have access to an infinite number of timelines, and you can change tracks at any time.
By mindfully practicing the process of inspiration I am consistently reminded that the light will always overcome the darkness. By empowering the light there is never really any reason to have a negative attitude toward people, places, situations or things that evoke negative emotions. It is said that growth comes through stress, and that as human beings we are meant to experience life in an expansive way. To paraphrase information presented by Abraham and Esther Hicks, “By embracing the ebb and flow, the good as well as the bad, and using that contrast, you will quickly discover that focusing and letting go of resistance with regard to what you don’t want in your life, that you come into alignment with a clear path of action, moving toward what you do want in your life”.
I recently had two experiences with people, places, situations and things that inspired me to compose this article. The first was when I was waiting for my car to be serviced at a local family owned and operated auto center. I’ve been there many times over the years, but that day I chose not to hypnotize myself with my smart phone whilst waiting, and decided to observe my surroundings. I began to read a framed article that hangs on the wall in the waiting room. The article is written by the wife of the owner. It is about their journey to China to retrace the process by which they originally brought their two adopted daughters into their lives. If you are familiar with the fate of new born girls in China, the number of American and European couples who are fortunate enough to adopt these infants is inspiring enough.
In the article, his wife masters the use of the written word by describing in great visual detail the experience of the two separate paths that brought the girls together with their new parents. First, the heartwarming story of how joyfully these American parents were welcomed and their daughter celebrated by the orphanage where they adopted her many years before. Then, how the second daughter’s life was saved by a young man who was sleeping on his parent’s rooftop to escape the heat of the home’s interior during the hot summer months. He could not fall asleep and happened to hear a small infant crying in the middle of the night. He followed the crying only to find the American parents future daughter left at the entrance to his small town. Today, due to the inspiration that spurred these American parents into action, their two daughters, now young adults, are shining their light on the world, illuminating it into a better planet with their creativity and imagination.
The second was a Bosnian wedding reception that I recently attended. I was a political science major in my undergraduate education at Washington University from 1997 to 2001 and we studied the Bosnian humanitarian crisis in real time as it happened. To know the tragedy of what these human beings went through, and then to be at the wedding reception among a large group of the Bosnian refugee population of Saint Louis that came here as a result of this crisis inspired me. Again, the contrast between the light overcoming the darkness flooded me with overwhelming emotions of appreciation, compassion, joy and love. To be honest, I had to hold back the tears.
The reception began as wedding receptions always do, with the introduction of the wedding party and the first dance of the bride and groom. The wedding hall quickly turned into an energetic experience of watching Bosnian men, women and children being inspired by and attracted into a traditional dance that encircled the bride and groom. At first, many simply looked on expressionless. But as the charge of positive emotions overtook the room like a single drop of food coloring into a pitcher of water, people became inspired and approached the dance floor with wide eyed smiles and enthusiastic body language. Round and round, the methodical dance lasted for over 20 minutes. It was an inspirationally attractive sight to see so many people praising this young couple. Both of them are first generation Bosnian Americans. It reminded me that as a nation, America is still a melting pot of immigrants and refugees whose previous generations were inspired into action by their wishes and desires for a better life. Now years later, the evidence of their imaginations and creativity is evident all around our great country and in the eyes of new generations of lives that have come to exist as a result.
As individuals, we all have access to inspiration in our lives and accessing it is as simple as directing our attention to it. Remember the second definition of inspiration. Sit now for a moment and close your eyes, drawing in deep breaths through your nose and out through your mouth. Calm yourself and visualize your wants and desires. Envision what successfully doing this will look, feel and smell like when you arrive successfully at the end results. Focus on that for a moment and then pay attention to where your mind wanders. Do you maintain that good feeling of inspiration, or is it replaced in contrast with feelings of doubt and resistance that the path to success is not accessible to achieve the end result?
You see, every morning when we wake up, we begin by placing our order with God, Intelligent Infinity, the One Infinite Creator. The things that we direct our attention to are the things that grow. To paraphrase another quote by authors/lecturers Abraham and Esther Hicks, “The path of least resistance is the path of most allowing your wishes and desires to flow into your life.”
We are meant to live a life of abundance and expansion. If we express our desires and wishes, and then react with thoughts, words, actions, attitudes, emotions and feelings of resistance about them, then we bring on more abundance of the resistance, making it increasingly difficult to successfully attract and receive our desires and wishes into our lives. In other words, most of us think, say and act like if we get our wishes and desires then we will be happy. But the truth is that we must first become happy and feel good from the inside out. By doing this and developing positive attitudes towards our desires and wishes then it becomes virtually effortless to employ our imagination and creativity to chart a path of action to successfully achieving the end results.
Inspiration has much to do with a path to enlightenment. As we can now begin to understand, enlightenment is really more about letting go of resistance, and the attitudes and feelings that no longer serve us. For this resistance is what holds us down from realizing our truest, highest selves. So be inspired to successfully receive your desires and wishes, and persevere with inspiration every day in that pursuit. Your subconscious thought reel will be churning every day regardless, so you might as well direct your thoughts, words and actions toward feelings of living a more positive and abundant life. We only have so much time to be alive on this planet. Choose today to jump the track, and spend your life in the pursuit of happiness by using inspiration to create a path of least resistance, a path of most allowing.
In conclusion, please consider these lyrics by the musician Louis Prima from his song “When You’re Smiling”. My wish for you is that you will be inspired. Enjoy!
When you’re smiling, When you’re smiling
The whole world smiles with you
When you’re laughing, When you’re laughing
The sun comes shining through
But when you’re crying you bring on the rain
So stop your sighing be happy again
Keep on smiling ‘cause when you’re smiling
The whole world smiles with you
I used to worry
I used to hurry
Each time it started to rain
Now I see light
Learned wrong from right
And you’ll never hear me complain
Jon Patrick Frieda is the Vice President of Marketing and Sales for Neels Pharmacy, #8 Crestwood Executive Center, Crestwood MO 63126. 314-849-3123.