Spirit in the Village

Food for Thought Fridays - Observing the Cycles of Life

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

The last several months have been one of the most enlightening personal growth experiences of my life. Challenging in many ways, during this time I have made my focus on personal growth, meditation and connecting to what many call the deeper wisdom that lies within each one of us. This morning as I meditated I was putting my attention on the day to come. As I reflected there was a subtle awareness that I was coming to the end of a cycle.

What is a Cycle?

Cycles of Fame

The first time I ever heard the expression “cycle” in reference to life was from an interview where George Harrison (Video) explained the rise, fame and eventual break-up of the Beatles. He talked about the cycle being like energy or a feeling. Being in the band felt good in the early to mid 60’s and then as the decade went on the good feelings gradually diminished. By 1968-69 the bad feelings were dominant and the band had to break-up.

What happened? They matured. They got married. They developed other interests. Eventually the role of being a Beatle was no longer fun.

The energy for the Beatles eventually had to die.

Cycles within a Career

Careers have cycles. When you start a new job or business there is a new energy that feels exciting and good. Good feelings might last for year, two years or twenty years and your intuition says, this is good, keep going. And then something happens, an event, a trigger where you observe the energy starting to wane. The energy of your job starts to fade, you become less passionate and over time those good feelings can turn negative.

Knowing what I know today when you stop enjoying your job or career it’s usually a good time to ask what can I change? Many stay in jobs longer than the natural cycle and they end up feeling miserable. Over the years this impacts our health, our relationships and our quality of life. Cycles are different for everyone. Some cycles last 20 years and others last 6 months.

Source: Flickr Evelyn Arthur Richman

Cycles for Inner Reflection and Personal Growth

This latest cycle for me began with the loss of a job. I remember the first instinct (after losing the job) was to go within. The instinct was strong. My intuition was telling me, Listen! Go Within! Observer your feelings, thoughts and take time to connect with your inner being. The problem we often have with jobs or careers is we get too focused on the work and we lose connection with who we are. We forget about our needs and what makes us happy.

The events in the last several months of this cycle have moved in slow motion for me. Every event, challenge or experience has been magnified, vivid and right in my face with thoughts and emotions triggered at every level. Meditating, journaling, writing and talking about my experiences have been my way to gain clarity and make sense of all that has happened.

What is great is the experiences have made me stronger, have allowed me to connect to my real interests and passions and have enabled me to feel more authentic within my relationships and life.

Enjoying the Cycles of Life

Every experience in life has a cycle. Whether it’s a job, a relationship, success, fame or an illness or our life, everything is born and eventually dies. A subtle awareness of the cycle makes you realize cycles are good. If you are going through a bad cycle then it is good to know that it will eventually come to an end. Cycles can be fun and when one ends it should be celebrated. There’s a new cycle coming. It’s part of the process of life.

My instinct tells me that I am coming to the end of this cycle even though outward events have not yet manifested. The feeling is there. The feeling is a good one.

Life is good.

Food for Thought Friday - Navigating the Inner and Outer Worlds

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

This past couple of weeks have been an interesting time of personal growth. Business activities have taken me away from blogging and I am always frustrated when I lose consistency with my posting because I feel I get out of the groove.

The good news is each new day or week allows me to get back on track.

Meditation is Crap!

Several weeks ago one of my friends said to me, what’s all that meditation crap you’re doing on your blog? Do you really believe in all that $#%@?

I smiled and I told him my meditation was part of a much larger government conspiracy that was planning to take over the planet but he should not worry because I put in a good word for him. He looked at me slightly puzzled, we laughed and then talked about baseball.

What I've noticed is people in social settings have a hard time with those inner conversations about feelings, thoughts or even ideas. In the business world conversations tend to focus on presenting an image, demonstrating how smart or funny you are or achieving some goal or objective. We are so conditioned to look only at our outer world especially in business. We focus on our image, careers, financial portfolios, houses, cars, TVs or whatever.

Little recognition is given to the inner world, yet in my conversations lately I am noticing the inner part of every person - in plain view.

What do I mean by Inner World?

The outer world is what we do. We drive our cars, we go to work, we go shopping and we do things. The inner world is how we interact within our minds, our thoughts, feelings or what I call the inner self. Some people will mistake what I’m saying and think I’m talking about God or getting religious but I’m really not. You can be an atheist or even a scientist and still go inside and listen to your thoughts or your feelings.

Your belief in God has nothing to do with your inner world.

In social gatherings and with some practice it becomes easy to observe the inner world of others. When you connect on an inner level you get a sense of whether a person is honest, telling the truth, really interested in you or generally whether they are a good person.

If the other person is connected to their own inner self (either consciously or naturally) many times you will feel a great connection and there is an opportunity for awesome conversation.

Why is the Inner World Important?

When people ask me what has meditation and inner reflection taught me I tell them it has allowed me to connect better with people. From a personal level it has allowed me to be more real, be more in tune with what I want and have more fun. Most importantly it has allowed me to create a better outer world experience.

The inner and outer world exists in every person. The real question becomes how much time do we give to our inner experience and how do we create a balance between our inner and outer realities?

Next week I will post a review of Seth Godin and some ideas on social media.

Food for Thought Fridays - Fun & How Do You Combine Two Worlds?

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

This week has been an exciting week for personal growth with some fascinating insights that have helped me to understand more clearly how to get what I want and what holds me back. Sometimes the most important pieces are not explainable until after you go through the experience and understand the teaching.

Here are some tidbits from my learning for the week:

Listening to our Instincts & Having Fun

Last Sunday afternoon I was planning to do some writing and preparation for the week but the writing was feeling heavy. Suddenly this thought came over me to go skating. What a great idea! I checked out the website of the local ice rink and noticed they had public skating that afternoon. I got in my car, drove to the rink, sharpened my skates and for two hours was in a place of bliss and total enjoyment.

Image from Miskan on Flickr

The funny thing was I hadn’t been skating for 10 years and I realized I missed skating (and playing hockey) so much. So where did that thought come from? I have no idea. What I do know is as adults we tend to get locked in to our responsibilities to earn money, focus on our careers, raise families and we forget to have fun. Life becomes all work and no play.

Why hadn’t I been skating for 10 years? Because I forgot what it was like to be a kid and have fun.

The Lesson: Having fun and doing the things you love is important; especially for adults.

Your State of Mind & Feeling is Important

My good friend Deb (who I met on Twitter) reminded me of one of the important lessons in life. Our quality of life depends on how we feel.

She said always go for what feels good. I listened to her message and the skating example is one the outcomes but I applied that idea to my whole week. What I discovered is when you go for the good feeling you really do feel good.

Could it be that simple?

How do you Combine Two Worlds?

For years I have been fascinated with the human mind and in my own personal and spiritual growth. From my blog I talk about meditation, inner growth and how to find balance. At the same time I work in the world of business and technology where I find the overall experience to be out of touch with the personal or spiritual side of life.

Although most executives put on a good face and talk about balance for the media in my experience in the boardroom life balance seems secondary. Workaholism abounds and in my observation people seem stressed and frustrated with their careers.

I have always felt the need to wear two hats. One is my corporate self that talks about profit, ROI, value and uses all the good corporate words that business people like to hear. The second is more real side that wants balance, harmony, cooperation, fun and quality relationships.

I am starting to see the bigger picture that as we create balance in our lives it is critical to feel you can combine all aspects of yourself into your career. This is a work in progress for me and I don’t have all the answers but I do want to find a way to combine the two and not feel I have to wear two hats.

As I look around the business world I know there are people who are balancing their real passions with their careers and I am looking forward to figuring this out for myself.

Food for Thought Fridays - 5 Reasons Why My Blog is Perfect

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

In our society we get sucked into a number of conditioned behaviours, one being the idea of perfection. Many of us feel that to prosper we need to be perfect. Traditionally women have been conditioned to think constantly about their appearance or the need to be slim or beautiful. Men are conditioned with the need to make money and have a successful career. Many of us carry this burning need for perfection in whatever we do.

While it is good to strive for our goals it is our attachment, fixation and addiction to perfection that creates stress and suffering.

The Perfect Blog

In the blogging world I’ve found myself having this desire to build the perfect blog; to create quality posts, have perfect post frequency, great layout and design and hundreds or thousands of readers. The reality is my blog is imperfect at least according to the norms of the experts.

I’m learning however that perfection is in the eye of the beholder.

Here are 5 reasons why my blog is perfect:

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder
If you look at Susan Boyle’s recent success she was able recognize her own perfection and overcome society’s pre-conceived assumptions about her appearance. My blog is the same in the sense that those who look deeply enough can see the perfection.

Learning is difficult when one starts at perfection
If my blog and experiences were too perfect then people might become suspicious and worse yet they might think it’s impossible to do what I do. Blogging, Facebook, Twitter and social media are the great equalizers of our generation and everyone should feel they can have a voice and more importantly express who they are.

Marketed perfection is fake and provides no learning
Corporations have difficulty creating a real voice in the social media world because of corporate speak or too much fake marketing. Many bloggers attempt to be like corporations and create this illusion of perfection, but for readers their content feels contrived. My posts are not attempting to market the illusion of perfection. In the web world people want more authenticity.

Organic growth allows a person to evolve
By allowing my blog to grow naturally or with flow I’ve let go of the need to make everything perfect. If there is a bad post or a gap between posts it shows there is real person behind the site. This is good. Organic growth is better for me because my interest is in building relationships and a site that will be around in 10 years.

Perfection is about the journey not the destination
Most people see their goals as an end game. My life will be better after I have this experience. The exciting part of building this blog has been the opportunity to see it evolve and share the experience with others. Relaxing into the journey is part of the perfection.

Meditation Update

I’ve been following through with the meditation Deepak Chopra provided to the audience on Monday. This meditation has been so powerful that I’ve decided to increase my length of time in meditation to 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes in the evening. I’m feeling more empowered, centered and connected through this experience.

This meditation has helped me to connect to pranic breath (I think that’s what you call it). This is breathing that comes from a deeper place and is difficult to explain. If there are any experts on pranic breathing please send along any information.

Deepak Chopra - Consciousness, Awareness, Meditation and Art

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

Deepak Chopra through his books and recordings was the first to explain to me God or consciousness from a scientific perspective. On Monday April 27th I had the opportunity to hear Deepak once again during his visit to Toronto.

What Does Science Really Know About God?

There are many perspectives on what we call God or consciousness, so many in fact that we rarely agree. Our religious or spiritual traditions teach us how to live and within stories we are encouraged to have faith however the biggest challenge is so much is un-provable from a scientific perspective. Chopra and other ground breaking philosophers and scientists we are getting closer to helping us understand God.

We are not our bodies

Chopra tells the story of life from the perspective of our bodies, our minds, beliefs and our emotions. He says science shows us today that we are none of these. He uses examples from quantum physics that describe how with each breath we take in 10 to the power of 22 atoms from the universe. That’s 10 plus 22 zeros atoms from just one breath. When we breathe out we do the same and with the simple act of breathing these atoms are re-creating our bodies, our organs, our heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, etc.

He says within 3 years the human body recycles 98% of itself and what makes up your body today might be atoms from a plant, a snail or other human beings. He says each human living today has over a million atoms that were once in the body of Christ or Buddha but we also have a million atoms that once belonged to Hitler or Saddam Hussein.

We intimately share our bodies and yet we live in this illusion that we are separate.

Science has proven that we are not our bodies.

Our thoughts, beliefs, emotions, possessions and relationships

What about our thoughts, beliefs or emotions?

Deepak describes while we can understand the physical nature of the body and mind there is something within that is unexplainable.

He calls it awareness. Other philosophers call it consciousness, aliveness and some call it God.

Deepak goes on to say that awareness is non-local meaning it’s not necessarily located within our body or brain. In fact we don’t know where it’s located. He says it is both local and non-local at the same time meaning awareness within you or me is part of a much greater universal consciousness or universal mind.

Why Does Knowing about Awareness Matter?

Our bodies, our possessions, our relationships, our jobs and those things we think are real are actually not real at all. He says our interest in the material world is more like a “superstition” or even an “addiction” especially when they take over our life.

If our bodies, minds, relationships or possessions are not real then why are we here? This is where most people get lost in this teaching because each one of us has a job, families, mortgages, wants and desires. This is where it becomes important to listen to the next phase of what he says. By knowing we are awareness we have the ability to tap into that awareness and improve the quality of our lives.

What I like about Chopra is his willingness to go after the highest truth and although is a little mind bending what he speaks of makes sense. The next part describes how he gets in touch with that awareness.

A Meditation to Connect with Awareness

Here is a meditation for getting in touch with that awareness.

• Close your eyes, relax, breathe, listen to your breathe and get comfortable.
• Think about those areas of your life where you feel grateful. Having gratitude opens the doorway to awareness.
• Put thought in what you want from your life from relationships, career, health, abundance, prosperity or whatever it is for you.
• Silently meditate and repeat within your mind the mantra “I AM” “I AM” and continue to repeat for 15 or 20 minutes. If you get off track then just bring yourself back into the “I AM” mantra.

This meditation is designed to connect us with the universal consciousness or awareness. By connecting with our awareness we can tap into the power of the creative process or the universal mind.

Everything in this world once started as a thought. To create a chair there is first the thought, the planning, assembling the materials and then construction. All things from buildings, to artwork, and even relationships are created with thought first.

Art and it's Connection to the Soul

The day after Deepak we went to the AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario) in Toronto and as I walked around looking at the works of art I began to connect with that sense of the awareness. Artwork sometimes can allow us to connect deeper within our soul.

One thing I know for sure is the awareness can only be explained to a certain point with words. In reality it can only be experienced.

I’m going to practice Deepak’s meditation of Gratitude, Desires and then the mantra of I AM and I’ll keep you posted on how that meditation comes together.

Here is an interview with Ellen and Deepak.

Food for Thought Fridays - A Prayer for People Who are Suffering

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

In my meditation practice I often find the experience differs from day to day. On some days meditation is about aligning my schedule or organizing my thoughts or letting my thoughts flow for an upcoming blog post. Other days there is simply a quieting of thoughts and listening. Other times my meditations carry a very heavy emotional burden or energy that I feel within my body.

This whole week has been about carrying a very heavy emotional energy.

We live in a world where crazy things happen and people do really dumb things. They hurt one another and sometimes they rarely recognize the damage they do with their actions. The psyche of human beings has been damaged over the course of history and when people grow they tend to inherit both positive and negative traits of their parents. On the negative side this includes deep seated hurt feelings, as well as negative beliefs, judgements, fears, anger and resentment.

When we take action that comes from a negative feeling within ourselves it always breeds a negative response. When we act from a negative place our actions are not voluntary but instead come from deeply held wounds within our unconscious and within our psyche.

This week my prayer is for all the people around the world who are suffering wit

Religious and Cultural Balance – Part 2 in a Series on Work-Life Balance

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

When I ask people what they feel is the major cause of strife in the world, I’m usually given one word: RELIGION!

Whether you’re a believer or non-believer when we look back at history, wars, genocide and conflict in the name of religion are common. Ironically at the core of most religions is a message of peace, good will or the golden rule yet with all those good intentions religion contributes to conflict or misery around the world.

Is the search for God engrained within us?

Human beings have a natural inclination to search for something beyond life. The earliest civilizations looked to the stars and heavens for answers. At some stage in our lives we all ask the question; why am I here? What happens to me when I die? Where did I come from before I was born? Etc… I’m convinced that our search for spiritual meaning is inherent within us. Even for Atheists there is a search for understanding and based on that search opinions are formed.

Our quality of life would greatly improve if we could find a way to create religious and cultural balance. Karen Armstrong is a well known author who has written a number of books on God and world religions. She spoke at one of the Ted conferences and discussed her Counsel for Compassion as a way for religios leaders to find peace.

I’ve split her talk up into 3 main areas aligning with my theme of factors that I believe would help to create more balance on a religious and cultural level.

Here are some highlights of her talk and video is included below:

A. Leadership and a Common Vision

In her travels Ms. Armstrong says religious leaders from around the world are looking for ways to find common ground, peace and understanding. She says even in places like Pakistan (where democratic freedoms are repressed) there is a yearning amongst the population to find a way to live in peace.

Looking for Common Themes

Every major faith she says, has a common idea of “compassion” or what can bring you into the presence of the divine (God). She says when bringing spiritual philosophies together looking for common themes is important and every one of the major world religions uses the idea of the Golden Rule to treat others as you want to be treated.

Hijacking Religion

She says religion today has been hijacked. Even in Christianity where Jesus taught love your enemies, Christians today around the world judge others. Teachings of Islam or Judaism that teach hate and intolerance have also been hijacked. She says there is a religious illiteracy where compassion and the golden rule are put into second place behind beliefs like, the need to be right.

Religion as a Force of Peace and Harmony

She goes on to say, religion should be made a force for harmony in the world and the golden rule should be applied globally. We should not treat other nations as we do not want to be treated ourselves. She says there is a hunger for change and the desire for change is global.

What’s needed is a coming together of leaders from all religions to find common ground.

B. Changing Fundamental Beliefs - Acceptance versus Tolerance

Ms. Armstrong says the most critical part to changing attitudes is to shift our belief from being tolerant to acceptance. These words have a power because by accepting another person or their religion it means we embrace them for who they are. This shift in attitude will require wisdom and leaders from all religious faiths to have vision to lead and show the way.

A Global Movement – A Charter for Compassion

Ms. Armstrong finished her discussion with her wish:
“You would help with the creation, launch and propagation of a charter for compassion crafted by a group of inspirational thinkers from the three Abrahamic traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and based on the fundamental principle of the golden rule. We need to create a movement among all these people who want to join up in some way and regain their faith which in some way has been hijacked.”

The charter would create guidelines as to how to interpret the scriptures working together to create a document that would be signed by at least 1000 of the leaders.

She wants leaders to look at their religion, reclaim it and make religion a source of peace in the world. Organizations like the Alliance of Civilizations at the UN could help to foster this process and establish a neutral voice.

C. Technology, Communication & Community

One thing that she does not cover is the power of technology, communication and community to deliver both the message and vision of leaders from around the world. I’ve talked about this before but technology gives us the tools and makes it possible for us to establish religious and cultural balance in our lifetime.

I’ll discuss more about religious and cultural balance in future posts.

Some Topics for an Exciting New Week

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

Last week was somewhat fragmented for posting although in terms of insights and personal growth it was fantastic week! This week I have some announcements but first here are some thoughts on meditation and what can happen when you commit to any form of personal growth practice.

My Experience with Meditation

Meditation allows you to reduce the chatter within your mind and connect more fully with your inner source or inner intuition. However, when you start silencing the mind, old thought patterns, beliefs and emotions can come to the surface. Often the experience comes in the form of mental or emotional resistance which I have found is an opportunity to break through old beliefs, fears or behaviours. When resistance comes up I’ll usually meditate, journal, listen to my intuition (or dreams) or ask for ideas from others who I can trust to understand and work through the lesson.

My lesson has been to let go of rigid thought patterns and allow my intuition to guide and move me more into the natural flow whether I'm writing, searching for a new career or dealing with events that come up. Over time meditation allows you to build your intuition muscle which in my experience becomes an invaluable guide for making decisions.

Guest Post at Baby Boomers Knowledge Center

Martin Diano at Baby Boomers Knowledge Center asked me to write a guest article which is due to be published this week. The article is called “Baby Boomers and the Technology Generation Gap”

Featured Articles will soon be Available in PDF Format

There were a few feature articles that I had written in the past that had a lot of hits. I wanted to start filing these articles a little better and making them easier for new visitors to see. These articles will be available this week.

Observations, Mind Stuff, Visualization, Goals & People

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

The last few days have been interesting. In my post on Monday I spoke about 6 steps for letting go of our mental resistance. Yesterday I spoke about Anger and how it can be a motivator to help us to move forward. There has been so much going that I thought today’s post could offer some tidbits from what I’ve been learning.

Mental Resistance

Remembering the old adage what we resist persists. When we hold rigid opinions, judgments or beliefs about ourselves or others we are in resistance. The way to let go of our resistant thoughts is to become flexible in our minds, identify those thoughts that limit us and then shift our perception toward a more positive thought. When you let go of your judgments, rigid opinions or negative beliefs your mind relaxes and you feel great.

Here's the link to the 6 steps.

Negative & Positive Emotions

Positive and negative emotions are part of our experience as human beings. When we experience negative emotion it’s okay to sit with the feeling, meditate and know that like the flow of life this too shall pass. Contemplate what is bothering you, meditate and move your mind toward the positive thought. Staying in negativity too long can harm us. Sometimes we need triggers to bring us back into the positive, friends, family, books, music, words… whatever it takes… reflect and bring your mind back into the positive state.

Positive thoughts and emotions are the only way to go.

Meditation & Visualization

Sometimes our dreams and desires can seem elusive. We have our goals, we know what we want but at times it may feel like a pipe dream if it hasn’t yet happened. Some will give up and say this impossible, move into a negative mind state and stop the pursuit of their dream.

Let’s say you have a goal for your career. Here are some tips: write it down, let it come from your heart, start to see it happening in your mind, meditate and when you meditate visualize and see yourself in that place, in that position, working with those people, networking and having those positive experiences. Do it everyday for just a few minutes. Keep your goal front and center, focus but at the same time let your mind relax and see yourself doing and experiencing what you love. When negative thinking or negative resistance comes in just know it’s temporary and do what you can to get back into a positive frame of mind.

Visualization can have huge benefits in helping you to move in the direction of your goals.

People, Stories & Gratitude

Last night I had a chance to attend a song writers competition at a pub in Guelph, Ontario. Although I wasn’t participating (here's my song page) the talent was amazing and I couldn’t help looking at the musicians who got up on stage and being awed by their creations. Some of them were nervous, others seemed more relaxed, some already rock stars in their own minds but each one of them had a story to tell.

Over the past few days I discovered each one of us has a story to tell and the real essence of our lives is our stories. Finding our true passions is part of the story we tell and part of life’s journey. For some reason last night time stopped for me as I realized...

Finding our true passion is the only real truth in life.

Someone asked me a similar question at the site Divine Purpose Unleased and I didn't have an answer. Today I feel I have that answer.

Letting Anger be your Motivator

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

Yesterday was an interesting day being one of those days where nothing seemed to come together. In the morning I wrote the post 6 Steps for Letting Go of Mental Resistance . Now most of my blog entries flow and I can complete them within 45 minutes to an hour. This one took almost 3 hours to write. Over the weekend I had done some work around letting go of resistance and it seemed like a no brainer. Thinking, I’ll write this up pretty quickly and I’ll be on my way. Boy was I wrong!

Monday’s are usually my toughest day to get into the flow of writing or work. My mind is usually a little more relaxed and I find it takes me time (at least the morning) to get up to speed for the week. The rest of my day flowed in some ways but by about 5pm I was spent. I was exhausted and my wife said to me, you look frustrated. I acknowledged that I was frustrated and took some time away to clear my head. At the same time there was other chaos going on at the house that pushed my buttons. I got angry, frustrated, pissed off and recognized that these emotions were not going away any time soon. Better to just relax, read a bit and ride them out.

As I went to bed last night I was angry, frustrated and pissed off at just about everything. I slept well and when did wake I lay there for a while processing these emotions.

Law of Attraction & the Downstream Flow

Jerry and Ester Hicks in their books on the Law of Attraction frequently say, if you want to move toward your goals learn to align yourself with the downstream flow of your life. My understanding of this teaching is to let your emotions be your guide and let go of rigid thinking (beliefs, opinions, judgments) Rigid thinking keeps you paddling upstream and against the natural flow of your life. In the downstream the goal is to get to the better feeling place, which most times we think is a positive emotion or thought, however Hicks also say that sometimes the downstream thought is a negative one like anger, frustration, even rage and resentment.

Observing my anger and rage I started to realize that all my anxiety and frustration from the day before was all about my resistance to going with the downstream flow (which for me yesterday and this morning is anger, rage and resentment).

Negative Emotions as a Positive Motivator

When I get into those feelings my anger and rage do not become outer manifestations for yelling or tearing a strip off someone, although some might note that I seem a little more abrupt. The anger and rage are my inner emotions that I connect to, observe and feel within my mind and body. Using meditation I let those emotions sit and simply become the observer.

Being in the downstream flow these emotions of anger, rage and resentment are actually positive motivators and give me more determination to go after my goals. This is good thing to note because quite often people think only the positive thoughts and feelings matter.

Today as I go about my day I’m going to observe and play with these emotions. What I’ve found is the downstream changes all the time and as long as I’m moving within the flow then I’ll know that I’m moving in the direction of my goals.

Footnote: Anger is not a place where you want to stay for long but when the emotions do come up it's good to meditate with them you'll find they'll eventually change to something more positive.