I’m Sorry . . .

It appears I might have been confusing you.

Someone caused me to think about this the other day and it’s about something I was taught by, among others, Mary Morrissey.

When I first attended ‘Dreambuilder Live’ in Baltimore a few years ago we were taken through an exercise called the ‘Time Machine’ – and it’s a technique I now use and encourage my clients and colleagues to use on a daily basis.

I often precede something I’m talking about with “I am” which may be confusing because it is often an affirmation, rather than a statement of current fact.

The idea of ‘future pacing’, which is what the ‘Time Machine’ is about, is you and I framing our visions, our goals, our ambitions and everything we wish to be, do and have in the present tense.

Never “I will be” or I’m going to be” but always “I AM” – and the capital letters are part of it.

You see the subconscious mind which is ‘in charge’ of manifestation doesn’t understand the conscious concept of time.

If you or I say “I will . . .” or “I’m going to . . .” then those words will be taken literally as something which ‘will’ happen and it remains something which is ‘going to happen’ for ever – so it never actually ‘happens’!

What we asked was for it to happen in the future, not now, and just as we cannot go back to yesterday it is also true that ‘tomorrow’ never comes.

Everything we say or write about ourselves, who we are, what we do, what we have, must be affirmed in the ‘now’ because to the Universe, to Source, ‘Now’ is all there is.

I talked recently about timelines which may also have led to confusion because they are more to do with sequence than time.

In project management we sometimes consider ‘dependencies’ – one event being dependent on another, or one state of being having to be extant before another state of being can come about.

This idea does not necessarily have to do with the idea of ‘time’ which although it helps the conscious mind get a grip on things is not something other states of consciousness are concerned with at all.

Consider this: if you are building a house there is a distinct sequence of changes of state for the building to go through to cause it to become a fully functional ‘house’. Whatever the stage of build, it’s still a house, not something else.

Likewise, many websites are ‘under construction’ but they are still websites.

So if you or I give ourselves a particular title, or tagline, perhaps describing what we do and who we are – and what we do is still ‘under construction’ we are not being ‘pretentious’ or bragging, but positively affirming our intention to be and do whatever the title describes – at some point further along the ‘timeline’ we are travelling.

Other things – our goals and plans – have to be made true before whatever is ‘under construction’ can fully exist.

I AM whoever I say I am, You ARE whoever you say you are, and the more you and I buy ourselves and others in to those affirmations the closer we become to their being completely true.

To some people we encounter this may seem like lying as you or I may not, at that point along our timelines, appear to be who or what we say we are or seeming to do what we say we are doing.

But so long as we are true to our intentions it’s really not our problem, or our business, what other people might think.

Well, in a way it is because it sorts them out into those who believe in us and those who don’t, it helps us identify who we can trust.

I find sometimes that I don’t ‘fit in’ to some other peoples’ ideas of who I should be or what I should be doing. Have you ever felt the same?

I’m sorry I don’t fit in to their frameworks, not for me but for them, I’m sorry they have ‘conventions’ and frameworks they feel everyone should ‘fit’. I’m sorry they allow others to define what they can and cannot do – who they can and cannot be, and I’m sorry they meekly accept the labels they are given – or choose.

The thing is there are no ‘labels’ other than those we choose, and as Patrick McGoohan said in ‘The Prisoner’ – “I will not be pushed filed stamped indexed briefed, debriefed or numbered . . !”

You and I are different.

I AM different, and I’m sorry for anyone who can’t cope with that. Being ‘different’ however implies something else, which I’ll discuss next week.

One of Leroy Jethro Gibbs’ favourite phrases in the NCIS television series is “Don’t apologise, it’s a sign of weakness” but I believe sometimes it’s a sign of strength – depending on how it’s done, and why.

How about you?