What's Holding You Back

When I operate from the gifts and abilities God has given me, I am “in mission”. That’s my sweet spot. In mission, I impact the world around me in a positive way. I sincerely desire to live my life fully in mission and from a place of love by default.  However, this world has a way of injecting people and situations that present me with challenges. Whether it is the way someone reacts to me, a situation I perceive as negative, or seeing injustice in the world, there will always be opportunities for me to get out of mission and operate from my shadow.

When I operate in shadow, my goal is to get back into mission as quickly as possible. I used to focus on resisting my shadow, but I’ve learned over time that resistance is tiresome, frustrating, and unsustainable even when successful. Now, I’m learning to take a step back and first identify my trigger points that take me out of mission.  For example, one of my biggest triggers is disrespect.  When I feel disrespected, I default to responding in an unloving way. After I become aware of a trigger, I then look at my default response to the trigger. From there I can start to reprogram myself to respond from a place of love and light, rather than darkness. That may seem like it is easier said than done, but the truth is, we have the power of God living in us and that power is more than enough to overcome my egoic programming if I am willing to let it.

One of the greatest lies I have accepted as truth is, “I am just a sinner”. That message, repeated in my subconscious, serves to perpetuate the lie that I can’t keep from sinning. In other words, when I operate in shadow my brain says, “I did that because I am a flawed person and sin is in my nature”. That can’t be further from the truth. My true nature, my spirit-self, is perfect love. When I operate in shadow it is because I am choosing to yield to my ego for action rather than my spirit. When I can learn to yield to my spirit-self, there is literally nothing in this world that can hold me back. My work is to learn to accept that truth, identify my triggers, and reprogram my default responses to come from a place of love.

How about you? If you already know your mission and shadow, what’s holding you back from you operating in mission? If you don’t know your mission and shadow, I encourage you to take some time to identify both.