{"id":153,"date":"2014-10-23T21:24:29","date_gmt":"2014-10-24T02:24:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/?p=153"},"modified":"2015-10-26T09:43:33","modified_gmt":"2015-10-26T14:43:33","slug":"the-best","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/the-best\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/The_Best.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-154\" src=\"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/The_Best-300x233.jpg\" alt=\"The Best\" width=\"300\" height=\"233\" srcset=\"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/The_Best-300x233.jpg 300w, http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/The_Best.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\">We want <strong><em>\u201cthe best\u201d<\/em><\/strong> for our children and our loved ones. Often we write or see this phrase written as a closing salutation in letters or emails. We want <strong><em>the best<\/em><\/strong> for ourselves, too. Of course we do! We are expansive creatures, meant to be growing and experiencing more!<\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\">How do we get <strong><em>the best?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; border: 1px solid navy; text-indent: 20px; text-align: center;\"><strong>Drop your limited sense of self<\/strong> &#8211;Ernest Holmes<\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\">Obviously, we need to <strong><em>be willing<\/em> to receive <em>the best<\/em>.<\/strong> We need an attitude of really knowing we deserve and should have more. And we need to know <em>it\u2019s safe<\/em>&#8212; that having more really serves us. It\u2019s surprising how many times when working with a client on this subject of greater prosperity we have uncovered an underlying belief that the person will be rejected by family if s\/he becomes successful or more prosperous than they. Another unwillingness to receive greater good is a fear about not knowing how to act or handle money and other assets. The most unusual unwillingness regarding being successful that I\u2019ve come across is that of a client not wanting to furnish his parents with any possible evidence that they might have done a good job raising him! We can trip ourselves up in some pretty tricky ways!<\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\">Here\u2019s one from my own experience: James Allen, author of the much-loved little book, <em>\u201cAs a Man Thinketh,\u201d<\/em> <a href=\"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Your_controlling_desire.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-156\" src=\"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Your_controlling_desire-300x214.jpg\" alt=\"Your controlling desire\" width=\"300\" height=\"214\" srcset=\"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Your_controlling_desire-300x214.jpg 300w, http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Your_controlling_desire.jpg 355w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>said that <strong>we are made small by our controlling desires and made great by our dominant aspirations<\/strong>. When I first read this, I wondered what Allen meant by \u201ccontrolling desires.\u201d I have come to think that in today\u2019s language it means <em>a need to control something or someone.<\/em> It\u2019s like our present psychological concept of <strong>resistance<\/strong>: <em>we can be resistant to something\u2014or in this context of getting the best, we can be resistant to something NOT happening&#8211;to NOT getting the best<\/em>. In my personal case, I was resistant to my parents\u2019 telling me to stay small\/keep small, to act always as if I deserve nothing. The admonition went further than just being told to be careful to not act inflated or self-important; we were to be totally subservient. Dad used to say often, to all of us, \u201cWho do you think you are? We\u2019re nobody!\u201d Ironically, in my search to honor being a worthy human being, my resistance to being told to be small was, as James Allen pointed out, <em>keeping me small\u2014because that\u2019s what resistance does!<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\"><strong>Life doesn\u2019t happen through control; it happens by expansion.<\/strong> Control clutches and closes off; expansion requires us to be open in order to\u00a0receive more.<\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\"><em>So <strong>to prepare to receive the best<\/strong><\/em>, we must remove \u201csmallness thoughts\u201d by 1) replace limiting beliefs about ourselves and life, and 2) remove resistances and desires to control\u2014because they make us small, unable to receive.<\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\">Once we have removed blockages, we can move on to focus on <strong><em>receiving<\/em><\/strong>. And again, we run into the business of clearing away thoughts and actions &#8212; in order to be <strong><em>the best<\/em> container to receive <em>the best<\/em>. <em>Like attracts like.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; border: 1px solid navy; text-indent: 20px; text-align: center;\"><strong>We grow not by addition, but by subtraction<\/strong> &#8211;Meister Eckhart<\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\">Subtracting from our thoughts and actions that which is not aligned and supportive of our greater prosperity causes us to become <strong><em>the best <\/em>and clearest receiver we can be.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"color: #000080; text-indent: 20px; text-align: left;\"><strong>We become <em>the best receiver<\/em><\/strong> simply by taking one step forward at a time. <strong>Take your very best steps forward, one-by-one-by-one.<\/strong> We all do know what the most principled thing to do is in any given moment. \u00a0Just do it. <strong>One Step at a time. TAKE YOUR <em>BEST STEP FORWARD<\/em>.<\/strong> We can do it&#8211;and together, we can create <em><strong>the best world ever!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We want \u201cthe best\u201d for our children and our loved ones. Often we write or see this phrase written as a closing salutation in letters or emails. We want the best for ourselves, too. Of course we do! We are expansive creatures, meant to be growing and experiencing more! How do we get the best? [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,6,3,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ernest","category-life","category-my-thoughts","category-spirituality"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":231,"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153\/revisions\/231"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nancyherrick.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}