Pathway to your Potential (Pro/Con list)
We learn about ourselves through others. The sameness and the differences. It’s all teaching us about ourselves.
Think of someone you admire or anyone in your life right now and jot down some pro’s & con’s about them.
- The Pro’s will help you notice what you value about them (what you aspire to).
- The Con’s will help you notice also what you aspire to and the space you hold open for them to aspire to – their better version and your better version.
This exercise shows you where you are aligned. It shows you your boundaries, value-system, where your integrity is; where you’re at & where you ‘wish’ you were at. It shows you a pathway to being your potential – what you aspire to be, what you are learning in this human life, what you REALLY value and what is actually important to you.
I did this exercise with a few people in my life – random friends/foes and myself. This is just a snippet of what I learned to give you a working-example of my own value-system and judgements/belief systems so that you can do the same and learn about yourself.
Some people do this with popular figures who have inspired them like Oprah, Gandhi, Mother Theresa and such but I didn’t get much value out of doing it with people that I don’t know personally know in my life. Doing it with family members, friends, and especially people you don’t like – shows you more in your daily-life what you value and aspire to. If you do it with people who you think you know really well, it will help you identify what you like / don’t like about them and what that really shows you – is who you want to be.
PERSON A: (a close-friend)
- trusts in life, in the universe
- happy, healthy, fit, positive mind-set
- light-hearted around children
- doing what she wants to do in life
- natural
- optimistic, hopeful, loving
- entrepreneurial
- humanitarian
- judges/looks-down on and makes fun of others who doesnt see the world as she does, who does ‘wrong’ in her eyes
- didn’t help when she was inside a natural disaster (my own judgement at the time which is now released)
- can’t talk to her about what happened to me because it’s outside of her belief system / on a different frequency
- fearful of that which she doesn’t understand
PERSON B: (how I saw myself, before my dark-night-of-the-soul crisis)
- positive-polarized
- happy, love everyone, dances
- cares about the world
- healthy, natural, positive
- entreprenerial
- connected
- wants to share love with the world
- humanitarian
- motivated, passionate, purposeful
- sees every job as ‘service to others’
- brings light to the world
- sees the light in others
- sees everyone as doing their best and holds that space for them
- fearful without knowing it
- too much, too excitable
- financially fucked
- messy
PERSON C: (Me when going through last traumatic cycle / walking through the hellfire / dark night of the soul)
- peaceful, at ease, less excitable
- humble
- lives in the moment
- lives in truth of self without caring about the opinion of others
- negative-polarized
- doesn’t trust anyone including self
- physical/mental defence system: not allowing anyone in, disconnected
- not lighthearted
- defeated, humiliated, ashamed
- no faith, no beliefs, suffocating
What is the opposite of the negative beliefs?
The other exercise I did to understand my value-system is to write down the “opposite” of the “negative beliefs” in order to gauge what I value / aspire to.
- Negative-polarized } Postive-polarized
- Dark } Light
- Doesn’t trust anyone } Trust in life
- Serious } Light-hearted, playful
- Humiliated } Confident
- Hurtful } Helpful
- Fear } Love
- Financially fucked } Abundant, Self-sufficient
- Messy } Tidy
- Dirty } Clean
- Unhealthy } Healthy
- Materialistic } Thrifty
- Judges others negatively } Accepts others for where they are at / Sees the light in others
- Miserable } Grateful
Obviously I aspire to the ‘positive’ aspects of these negative traits I find in others and within myself.
At the time of doing this… I was so confused about my beliefs, and wrote this:
What would my higher-self / best-self do in this situation? How would they handle it? Become the person you want to be. What is this teaching me? How is this helping me? Was it delusional to see the best in everything? Do I just need to not be around others with self-defeating beliefs? Or am I supposed to use anywhere I am as the challenge/teacher? I used to think that I’m exactly where I’m meant to be, now I wonder if that is just another way of giving up, another permission slip to justify my failing of where I wanted to be.
Then I started doing other exercises that might help define my path, belief & values.
What would you like people to say at your funeral?
- She was there for me (Caring, compassionate)
- She cared about the world (Inspiring)
- Changed my life for the better (Someone to aspire to)
- Made me happy (Fun, happy, lighthearted, joyful)
- Lighted up my world (Shined her light)
- Always had a smile on her face (Happy)
- Didn’t waste her life (Made a meaningful difference)
What legacy would you like to leave in the world?
- Be your greatest self
- Follow your dreams
- Service to others
- Follow your heart
- Freedom from slavery
What or Who are you drawn to helping?
- Lightworkers
What is it that you would give them?
- Out of box ideas for living frugally
- Self-Sufficiency / Abundance
- Spiritual growth, personal development, positive-polarity
- Heart-centred, benevolent advice
- Natural health
- Websites / teaching
What difference would it make in their lives?
- Like-minded lanterns lighting the path for others
- Community – Connectiveness – Unity
- Healthier
- Freedom from their 9-5 to work on their soul’s path
- Spiritual development and service to others
How would that make you feel?
- Like my life has purpose and meaning
- More loving & creative
- A chain-reaction / ripple-effect out to the world
- Unity – more peace and harmony
What is it they need most?
- Community support & abundance
Past Experiences
- What did you enjoy doing?
Nursery work, planting seeds, hoeing, growing, Singing around camfire with acoustic guitar, communing with travellers and diverse cultures, dancing, singing, people being joyful, working together as a team – people helping each other, mutual care/respect, people enjoying each other’s existence, feeling important/needed/appreciated - What did you hate?
Feeling controlled, dominating / controlling / mean people, people only caring about themselves (opp: teamwork), forced to wake/sleep at certain times (no freedom over own time), early mornings, inconsiderate people, selfish people, closed-minds, ripping people off, stress. - Your authority (keywords that define you):
Freedom, lightworker - What jobs do you look up to and what do you admire about them?
Service to others / loving beings, natural healers, carers, teachers, mentors that provide opportunities for people to be their best selves, festivals & markets, humanitarian, charities - What parts of their job would you find the most fulfilling?
making a meaningful difference in service to others, appreciation, gratitude, not wasting life, legacy, helping unite the world, healing future generations, making the world a better place - Outside of work, what do you wish you could do all day long?
Guitar / campfire / community, surrounded by loving beings, travelling, meeting new cultures, deeply intimate connections, relaxed, spiritual growth, connection with other beings / creator - Where can you “be yourself”?
at home, when camping
Something I can’t answer right now because of the mix-match of my beliefs… unanswered questions that you might find helpful if you are further along than I am in this level of the game:
- If you had one year to live, what would you do before you die?
- What do I desire more than anything?
Then there’s the facing of obstacles and identifying what is holding you back.
Things that hold me back (the opposite being “things that move you forward”)
- Obstacles: Coffee, smoking, poker, social media, procrastination, not knowing what I want, asthma, fitness-level
- Forward-steps: } Walking, nutrition, juices, smoothies, salads, reading, meditation, yoga, qigong
What habits are holding you back from becoming who you want to be?
- Smoking, laziness, Coffee, depression, confusion, hopelessness, van, money, beliefs
What would move you forward towards your goals?
- Eating healthier, walking/exercising, getting online business going, packing up my stuff, moving
What can you do today/this week that would move you towards your goals?
- Visualization
- Gratitude / getting into a higher vibration
- Contacting a biz connection
- Packing my stuff
- Working on websites
- Backing up hard drive
- Salad
- Backup money
- Job-search
What moments bring you joy? Made you laugh?
- Helping sis with kids, first day of school
- Dancing around kitchen with Prue
- When someone I like was chasing me
- Meeting my long-term partner for the first time
- Singing with swedish backpackers
- Connected to love / everything / oneness experience
- Campfire connections
- Chatting with people who “get me”
What is one thing you can do today towards happiness?
- Sing and play guitar or listen to music
- Listen to Law of One
- Call a friend who gets me
- Make plans for a better future
- Imagine/visualise being loved / connected
- Concentrate on the “end/desired result”
- Deliberately maintain a positive, good vibration by doing only things that would raise my vibration
- Truly start doing things that make me feel good
- Release the “wanting” (wanting is the opposite of having) and know that my desires are already fulfilled
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