How To Use Your Spiritual Power

Your Spiritual Strength is a memory thief! Everything that matters to you is stored in your mind, allowing you to recall and utilise whatever memory you require. Your Spiritual Ability is a Daydreamer! You have dreams about things that happen in the future and in the past, and you can see into the future and the past.

How do you unleash your true power?

Most people live in a highly constrained circle of their full potential, according to William James, the founding father of modern psychology, who told his Harvard students today. The number one cause, he said, is a lack of faith in oneself.

While we all confront external obstacles, our biggest stumbling block is in our own thoughts… in our conviction in our own ability.

When we overcome this inner barrier, we get access to a pool of unimaginable strength from which we can overcome almost any other!

Here are five strategies to assist you get out of your own way and unleash the tremendous power that lies dormant within you (and too often lies dormant under a boatload of worry and doubt) to make the changes you've been putting off and become your own'superpower.'

Take 100% Responsibility (no blaming, finger pointing)

You have to take complete charge of your life – no matter what, as Cathy Burke highlighted on my podcast as she reflected on 20 years working with the lowest of the poor with The Hunger Project. Her words echo those of Viktor Frankl, a Holocaust survivor who wrote:

“There is a space between the stimulus and reaction spaces. You have the power to pick your response in that area. Your freedom and growth are dependent on how you respond.”

One of the most potent notions for personal development and professional success is this basic premise.

It all comes down to this: You can't always pick your life's circumstances, but you can always… always… choose how you respond to them. This means that, while events beyond your control may have influenced the state of your life – your career/business, health/wellness/stress levels, marriage/family/relationships, bank balance/finances… or lack thereof – no one else is to blame.

So, if you don't get an A in some aspects of your life, take a long, hard look in the mirror and ask yourself what you've done or failed to do that has contributed to the status quo and is preventing you from improving it.

You can't mend something you don't have. While it's convenient (and often justifiable) to blame your bad luck on someone else – your bad boss, slacker coworker, lying (previous or current) partner, dysfunctional family/parents, or your bad genes, or even the government and banking bosses – the money ultimately belongs to you.

It's easy to justify blaming others. However, it relieves you of the responsibility to take action. However, pointing the finger at someone or something other than yourself accidentally gives up your authority to others (those who may or may not care about your pleasure!)

Find Your Courage, as I mentioned in Find Your Courage: “Power is fueled by responsibility. It is diluted by abdicating it. Only by accepting complete responsibility for the situation of your life and heart, however humiliating it may be, can you take steps to rectify it.”

Focus your energy on what expands possibilities

We humans are predisposed to be Teflon for happy experiences and Velcro for negative ones due to an intrinsic negativity bias. That is, we are significantly more prone to focus on what is wrong, what is missing, what could have been better, or what should not have occurred.

This can put us in a self-created'mental wheelchair,' paralyzing us from taking steps that will grow and improve our future.

Allow me to explain…

My 18-month-old brother Frank was involved in a terrible motorcycle accident ten years ago, leaving him paralyzed. I remember sitting with him in his hospital bed about ten days after the accident, as the morphine began to wear off and the harsh reality of his damage began to sink in. As I sat there holding his hand, fighting back tears and wondering how he would ever cope with the loss of movement that lay ahead of him for decades, I couldn't help but wonder (he was forty-one at the time). He squeezed my hand after a few minutes and remarked to me, “Margie, there may be 5,000 things I can no longer do, but there are 10,000 things I can still do, and I want to concentrate on doing them all. I'm resolved not to let this injury dictate the course of my life.”

It was one of the most raw and inspiring experiences of my life. To say I was proud of my brother at the time is an understatement. Frank returned to dive diving after a grueling period of rehabilitation, resumed his motorcycle adventures (now with hydraulic wheels), and tried his hand at para-water skiing and snow skiing, among other things.

I tell you this tale because it often makes me think about how many of us, even if our legs are fine, become trapped in mental wheelchairs, focusing on what's wrong with our lives and what we can't change instead of focusing on what's good and how we can improve them.

I'm sure there are a lot of things in your life right now that aren't working out for you. However, every minute you spend thinking about what you can't accomplish is a minute you're not doing to change your condition. So don't surrender your control to what coulda, woulda, or shoulda happened.

Doing so only serves to handicap you – intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually – by trapping you in a cycle of bitterness, self-pity, blame, and victimhood, leaving you stuck in the past and unable to go forward.

“It had long been my observation that successful individuals rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and made things happen.”

Embrace life's curve balls (they're coming anyway!)

In military circles, it's a well-known axiom that no plan survives its first confrontation with the enemy. The same may be said for life. Your plans will go astray at some point, no matter how clever they are or how good you think you are at having all your ducks in a row. The sooner you accept that life isn't linear, that change is inevitable, and that nothing is guaranteed (except death and taxes), the less stressed you'll be and the more possibilities you'll have.

When the world as you knew it is tipped off its axis, it can take time to find your footing before moving forward, as I wrote in Make Your Mark. Embracing the discomfort of uncertainty, on the other hand, allows us to stop rejecting what we can't change and instead look for opportunities to learn, grow, and thrive in the midst of life's messiness. Every setback and difficulty is an opportunity to learn more about yourself and grow wiser. While you may not enjoy life's twists and turns, you will be happier if you lighten up, let go of control, and lean into whatever lies ahead.

When I've previously mentioned, I've had my fair share of unexpected ‘plot twists,' and while they've frequently knocked me down for a while, as I look back from the vantage point of my life today, I can see that my life is immeasurably richer for those times when things did not go according to my plans!

(This will be the subject of my future podcast!)

Train the brave (and don't wait until you're unafraid)

Too frequently, we believe that we must be bold, fearless, and courageous before we can make a change or take a risk toward our goals. Unfortunately, courage does not function in this manner. The only way to develop the courage you desire is to begin acting as if you already had it.

When you act in the face of fear, you weaken it while amplifying your own. So don't let fear or self-doubt dictate your actions.

How do you unlock your spirituality?

I was raised in a secular environment, and it wasn't until I was in my early twenties, when I began working as a hospice nurse, that I began to rethink my beliefs. Observing my dying patients interact with their family caused me to reflect about life from a new perspective, asking questions such as, “If the body is simply a shell, what happens to that spark of life after we die?” What happens to that energy? What ties us all together?

I began to have a strong urge to connect with something bigger than myself. But I felt lost—as if I didn't know how to express what I was looking for. In my pursuit for what I now know as a spiritual practice, I was bashful and clumsy. It took me a long time to compile a list of truths, observations, and touchstones that consistently guided me back to serenity and inspired me to live with an open heart. Here are eight easy actions that have helped me develop my own spiritual practice over time. I'm hoping they'll be able to do the same for you.

How can I increase my spirit power?

Seven Ways to Boost Your Spiritual Well-Being

• Examine your spiritual foundation. You are merely asking yourself questions about who you are and what you mean when you explore your spiritual essence.

What is your soul power?

Shadow is your soul strength. This determines that you can manipulate shadow and similar objects, such as mist, which is similar to shadow and can turn invisible and teleport.

How do you discover your power?

Positive affirmations should be used instead of negative self-talk. Allowing negative self-talk to dominate your thoughts will sabotage you more than anything else. Negative self-talk paralyzes you, preventing you from taking action, sharing your views and ideas, and taking chances and pursuing new opportunities. These thoughts will deplete your fuel tank, and if you're out of petrol, you're out of options.

Pay attention to the negative voices in your head and label them as such. Self-awareness is the first step in taking control of your life. Allowing these limiting beliefs to dictate your life and achievement is a mistake. Remove the negative thoughts from your mind, rephrase them, and replace them with positive affirmations.

How do I get into power?

It was probably eight years ago, but I'll never forget stepping out of a job interview and feeling like an utter badass as I stood on the crowded streets of midtown New York. I knew I'd aced the interview by being my most confident, in-control, and convincing self.

“This is how power feels,” I thought to myself, and I've thought about it often since then, especially during times of self-doubt or uncertainty.

Whether it was nailing a job interview, delivering a perfectly timed joke, or receiving a promotion, you've probably had a similar experience “After a friend's rant session, meeting a daunting deadline, or even sprinting across a finish line during a 5K, “this was really helpful.”

Repeatedly playing that version of yourself will establish a positive feedback loop, conditioning you to return there.

What is true power in life?

When you enjoy what you do, it connects with your values, and you follow your intuition and creativity, true power emerges. The more time we spend doing things in these places, the more authentic to ourselves we become. You can easily focus when you are in full power. You're driven and disciplined.