Guiding Thought

Through gratitude, our consciousness of Love expands, connecting each with All. Gratitude increases our awareness of unity; gratitude shows us our Wholeness. Gratitude is the bridge to knowing each other as One. What gifts we are to each other!

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What is the goal?

What is the Purpose?

When I feel like I am drifting, I bring myself back to these questions.

Goals bring purpose to every situation, every thought. But first the purpose must be decided. If the purpose is not first decided, there is no way to evaluate a thought or situation to see if it will serve the goal.

Before each Journey, I write an initial statement “Why a Journey of…” These statements clarify my goals and bring purpose to all my life-situations in relation to the goal of the Journey. Everything for each 40-day period becomes a marker or step toward the progress of reaching my goal. I decide what I want my outlook to be (currently gratitude), and each situation becomes a means for me to reach that outcome. It becomes a way to recognize what serves my goal and what does not and to filter out (discard) what does not.

The Ultimate goal—the goal for all of the Journeys combined—is Truth. The goals of each individual Journey gets me a bit closer to the Ultimate goal.

Goals by their nature are something I must stretch, or grow, to attain. Here, I call it “expanding my consciousness”. This really just means learning. But it is learning in a very specific direction.

This is not unlike any other goal-setting and learning process. If I want to learn how to do a lay-up, I learn the motion: dribble-step-step-gently toss the ball to the hoop. (I never quite got the “gently” part down!) The goal in this scenario is lay-up mastery, the movements are the fundamentals, and the practice becomes the proficiency.

Similarly, with these Journeys the goals are the “Why a Journey of–”, the Guiding Thoughts are the fundamentals, and practice becomes the proficiency. Simple, right!? (Except, I’m the one who never quite got the “gentle” part of a simple lay-up down!)

All learning can be broken down into such fundamentals (A-B-C, 1-2-3). Mastery of the fundamentals leads to proficiency in the skill. Skills build upon each other, establishing a new level of proficiency (simple words, Apple-Bear-Cat, lead to more complex words, Appreciate-Beauty-Charismatic), leading to and reaching more complex skills (sentences, concepts). With each new skill there are higher states of proficiency which can lead to more complex goals.

It always helps if a person knows why they are learning a skill: What is the goal? Why is this useful? What is the purpose? People tend to learn skills more easily when they find value in them (I have a friend who says, “Another day gone, and I didn’t use algebra!”).

Today I am reminding myself of my goals and their value. I just reread Why a Journey of Gratitude. I began today feeling like I have been drifting. I read that page and realize it is not the case at all. I am absolutely on track.

What were my goals from that statement?

Exude gratitude, thankfulness, happiness, love, appreciation

(Check. See day 01, 04, 05, 07, 21)

Exploring Divine Love as the end, the meaning, the point

(Check. See days 03, 06, 16, 18, 19)

Finding gratitude as a result of what happens when surrender turns to acceptance

(Check. See day 23)

Giving you my deepest gratitude

This is one of the great things about writing down goals. I can go back and see if I’ve done anything to accomplish them and be re-assured with my progress!

The only one that I have not done specifically is the last one: Giving you my deepest gratitude.

I am deeply honored by your presence here. You are helping me in ways that I am so grateful for—we are in this together, and I could not do this without you. You are a blessing to me and to all of Life. Thank you, thank you, thank you, with all my heart.