Competitive or Creative– which is better?

Which of the following scenarios is more inviting?

You struggle in a dog-eat-dog world, continually trying to be on top of things. Life becomes a daily survival of the fittest. Or…

You know that you live in an inclusive world, where everything is connected. You learn from the challenges, creatively and compassionately problem-solve and live your heart’s desires.

The first scenario illustrates existing on the Competitive Plane. The second one gives a taste of the Creative Plane. More on these important terms in a moment.

A helpful way to understand yourself is to observe how you operate, what model of reality you tend to use. Said differently, what is your framework? How do you orient yourself to being in the world?

Here is a great clarification for this important topic. Over a century ago, Wallace Wattles described the Creative and Competitive Planes in his classic works The Science of Getting Rich and The Science of Being Great.

These “planes” are states of mind that govern our thoughts and actions. They determine our way of being and how we show up in the world.

In our Spiritual Life Coaching and Healing Program we explore these worlds, let’s  share some key points in this article. In the process, it will help  boost your soul awareness and spiritual growth.

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What Lights You Up?

What lights you up?  What brings a smile to your face, straightens your posture, makes you lean forward and ready to go?

Our dear friend and colleague Micah Blacklight discussed activating your creative spirit on a past Soulful Living Show. He emphasized finding ways to embody a space that lights you up, which serves yourself and others. This light-you-up spot is the “happy point, the juice.”

The phrase “what lights you up” contains many wonderful elements. Let’s unpack four of its treasures, so we can use them to create an extraordinarily fulfilling life.

As a note, know that the “lighting up” can come from within or without. Internally, we may get sparked by a thought, feeling, memory or energy state. Externally, we might connect with a person, place, event or thing.

What lights you up has all of the following elements: 

Opening the Heart and Mind

Two things are required to awaken in this lifetime: opening your mind and your heart.

As you open your heart and mind, wonderful things happen to you.

With an open mind and heart, life becomes a wondrous adventure, one of continuous learning and creating.  You are able to be more in the moment ─ and notice more of the synchronicities that surround you.

On the other hand, when the mind and heart are closed, our view is limited. These blinders reduce emotions to constrictive ones, like fear, doubt, and anger.

It’s essential to open both the heart and mind. A too-open heart can cause you to be naïve and overly trusting. You lack discernment and can be the fool rushing in where angels fear to tread.

On the other hand, if your mind is open but your heart isn’t active, then you may become overly mental and analytical. You know things but are lacking a feeling about them.  Feelings may be hard to fathom and identify. You can grow detached from life and love.

As a note, for this article we are speaking of the mind that connects with source, not the physical brain, which filters the mind’s thoughts and energies. The mind uses the brain to communicate with the physical body.

We are also speaking of the spiritual heart here, not just the anatomical heart. The spiritual heart is a bridge to the soul and spirit. It opens us to the timeless realms ─ this connection then sends a transmission so we can be more in our body and present to our experience.

Here are a few suggestions for opening your mind and heart.

Four Benefits from the Pandemic

To state the obvious: the pandemic sucks. But complaining only gets you so far before it turns into its opposite ─ and then a negative attitude becomes another problem to deal with.

So instead, let’s look at what good can come from the pandemic.  (Did they say “good”?) In other words, how we can use the pandemic rather than be consumed by it?

Consider then the following four areas.

1. A time to consider our history 

Asking the Right Questions

Are you asking the right questions?  Perhaps more basically, are you asking ANY questions? Asking the right questions is critical for success in work, life and spiritual growth. As coach and holistic practitioners, it is central to our work as well.

Let’s explore why questions are so essential to living fully.

We often discuss ways to be more hopeful and live a grounded life,  one filled with joy and fulfillment.  Let’s start with a useful question: What gets in the way?

One of the signs that a person is off-course is living too much on autopilot.  That means letting the unconscious and others direct your life. It means being run by habits and routines, continually putting out fires in order to complete to-do lists ─ and starting all over again tomorrow.

Here’s another question then: How do you get out of this Groundhog Day kind of existence? How do you stop the momentum of hurry and worry and break the cycle?

In order to bring in more hope, aliveness and wisdom, pause and start to question. In other words, be aware of whether you’re just reacting and continuing on uninterrupted.

Take a breath… Explore what’s in this moment, as well as take in the big picture.

Here then are three ways to start asking good questions:

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5 Lessons from the Pandemic

The pandemic is changing our way of life. Part of this change includes experiencing multiple losses (such as health, income, freedom, emotional stability and more).

All of which is teaching us that less can be more.

Shifting more inward, the essence of things is emerging. Coming into view are five key lessons that are up for learning.  Let’s look at them now in brief.

How to Have a Fulfilling Life

To be successful is wonderful. That includes being abundant. Ultimately, you need fulfillment to be deeply satisfied, continually renewed and enriched.

Let’s examine what is fulfillment and how to “have” it. (Hint: it’s not something you can possess, and the more you try to grasp it, the more elusive it becomes.)

Fulfillment is a process, a journey. It’s finding more meaning, purpose and positive feedback in your life. It brings you to a deeper, more ever present place.

To be fulfilled, you draw from your past, hope toward the future and ground it all here right now. Let’s look at keys to your fulfillment.

Your Power

As Roman emperor and philosopher Marcus Aurelius said, “The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.” We can make those thoughts soul-infused with our presence.

By monitoring your thoughts and feelings, you can create a higher set point, the internal reference on how you view the world.

The old default set point is …

The Holistic Life Coach & Healer Success & Prosperity Quiz

If you are interested in Life Coaching and Holistic Healing, learning the keys to success and prosperity is an absolute must. It’s also important to be aware of the price of missing out. As entrepreneur Chris Grosser suggests:

"Opportunities don't happen. You create them."

This is important. In our own training and work with clients and students over the last three decades, we’ve seen how easy it is to get lost in the muck of a person’s situation. This isn't a pleasant place to be. And It’s completely unnecessary.

For this, we created the Holistic Life Coach and Healer Success and Prosperity Quiz. It's an opportunity to learn 12 keys for transforming your life and realizing your true potential.

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Finding Life Purpose: How to Get On Track

How do you find your life purpose and stay on track?

At a certain point, your life calls out to you to become more. This is a deeper call, beyond self-improvement or doing more of the same just better.

How then do you get to this higher octave, where you hear and play the wonderful music in your everyday life?

Our Life Purpose Story

In his forties, Phillip started to feel a growing dissatisfaction with being an educator. He felt good about helping children in the classroom, but somehow he was missing the boat, staying in the harbor of his life.

Jane had a more severe wake-up call. She burned-out at her high-stress architect job, finally getting chronic fatigue and was unable to work full time. She felt her soul was dying.

Eventually, we both found our truer callings as healers, coaches and energy pioneers, and were fortunate enough to stay together and become stronger in the process.

At First

To get an overview, let’s briefly track the path to realizing your life purpose. At first life is about growing up into adulthood. By early adulthood you can probably take care of your own needs and maybe support a partner and family.

Going Deeper into Life’s Mysteries

When we pause a moment, look up and wake up, we realize something…  We are surrounded in a mystery, a mystery play we call “life” in general, and specifically our own life.

So first, what does it mean that life is a mystery or “life’s mysteries”? A mystery is by definition “something difficult or impossible to understand or explain.” Can we “solve” life’s mystery or is something else going on here?

For example: just 4 percent of the universe (stars, planets and galaxies) are visible. The other 96 percent hides in mysterious dark matter.  And we are only talking about the physical world, not the internal, subjective parts of ourselves. How much do we know of our own thoughts, feelings and states? How much are we aware of in any given moment?

Yes, much to consider and explore here…

Though much of the light spectrum and physical world is unknown, and much of our own internal world is also hidden, we still have clues via outcomes. What is happening externally, and what are the results, however mysteriously created. We can take stock of our mood and mindset, even if we are not sure how we arrived there. We can certainly set the stage for favorable results and get insights from the outcomes we experience.

So here are four keys to exploring the mystery of life: