In the audio program, you practiced generating the energy of well-being. A second special energy that I'd like to make you aware of is appreciation. Like well-being, this is an energy that's quite rewarding to generate continuously, or at least frequently throughout your day. Appreciation is an energy somewhere between admiration, gratitude and unconditional love - and you might think of it as a hybrid of the three. To demonstrate the various uses of appreciation, I'd like to guide you through a short exercise. After reading through, you can perform the exercise either with your eyes open or closed. But you should be in a seated position, not driving or operating machinery of any kind.

To get started, please think back to the last time you saw something really beautiful, perhaps a beautiful sunset, or anything that really filled you with a sense of wonder or awe. Once you have the feel of that energy, try to expand it within you as much as possible. Now, I'd like you to take that feeling, turn inwardly, and project that energy inwardly to yourself. A full appreciation for who you are, as you are. Don't think about it - just generate that feeling of observing something of divine essence. No need to be different, better, wealthier, or happier in any way. Generate the energy of being okay with the way you are right now - something already perfect in its own way. Conditions may change, your life may change, but you will always be this person. Project the energy of appreciation, admiration, and unconditional love inwardly to yourself for a few moments before continuing (pause here).

SELF-ESTEEM

Self appreciation, or a kind of loving respect for yourself, is the foundation of self-esteem. And self-esteem can reinforce your efforts toward attaining just about any other objective that you might be working toward through this program. For example, to attract love into your life - which requires having love to offer others and an ability to accept love from them - will be much easier if you first have love for yourself. And not having love for yourself makes it very difficult to perceive others' love toward you as genuine.

A similar phenomenon will occur if you wish to attract more wealth or abundance into your life in any form. Feeling that you're worthy and deserving of wealth will reinforce such efforts. I'm not implying a selfish or egotistical attitude, but the feeling that you are just as worthy as any other person. Disliking yourself, denying yourself, choosing lack rather than abundance, while they may seem modest and likeable attitudes, do not help you or anyone. In fact you'll be much more likely to help others attract joy, love, wealth, and abundance into their lives if you've first done so for yourself. So even helping others begins with learning to love yourself.

And if you're trying to overcome shyness or social anxiety, ask yourself, would you have social fears if you were already so loving of yourself that no one else's negative criticism could affect you? Self esteem gives you the freedom to make mistakes, releases you from the need to appear perfect or hide parts of yourself, and allows you to be able to just relax with others and be yourself - to freely show them who you are, what you think and feel. When you're okay with what's inside you - who you are - and just let others like you if they choose, that's when the strongest relationships are formed. And if you suffer from poor self-image, know that while beauty is relative, self-esteem makes you more attractive no matter what. People are naturally attracted to secure, confident attitudes.

The benefits of self-esteem are going to touch just about every area of your life, so learning to increase your flow of this energy makes good sense. Even overcoming unhealthy habits and addictions is more likely when you hold an appreciation for yourself and your body. Self esteem reinforces decisions to discontinue activities that we know are harmful to us in any way - physically, mentally, emotionally, personally, financially, or spiritually.

In developing self-esteem, don't make the mistake of thinking "when I become a better person - or the person I want to be, then I'll be able to accept myself". It's really the other way around - the strongest sense of self esteem will include an appreciation for your humanness and imperfection, as you are now. Since self esteem impacts just about every aspect of your life, it's an energy to start with rather than work towards.

If you'd like to spend some more time generating this energy now, please feel free to do so. You might start by thinking of just one characteristic that you like about yourself, find that feeling of self-appreciation, and then continue expanding it. Project love, admiration, respect and other positive feelings inwardly to yourself. Or you might consider the manner in which you'd hope that your best, most supportive, and encouraging friend would communicate with you, and then try communicating some of those same thoughts and ideas to yourself. Once you've found the energy of self-acceptance and appreciation that makes you feel good - continue radiating it inwardly (pause here).

In self-generating the energy of inner appreciation, you can free yourself from reliance on external sources for the self-esteem that is so critical to your well-being. If done effectively, even when another acts negatively toward you, you'll realize that any problem that they have with you is really their problem. External events will have little impact on you. That you can appreciate and feel unconditional love for yourself is all that matters.

If you've lost track of the energy of appreciation that you were generating a minute ago, please try bringing it back now. If you've had your eyes closed, open them, and continue generating the energy as you look around you. Once you've gotten a handle on that feeling of appreciation, try transferring it to something that you see in your surroundings - anything. Maybe to a table in front of you. Or to a building, or a tree, a bird, maybe a person that you see. It doesn't matter what it is - simply feel the same appreciation for that object or being that you felt for your own inner self, or that you've ever felt for any beautiful or awe inspiring thing. Feel appreciation for whatever it is that you're looking at simply for it's being part of your world, for offering you this experience, for the universal essence underlying the visual appearance. Appreciate any perfection or imperfection, or any humanness. If you hold any spiritual inclination, realize that everything you see is created by and made of the same universal source energy, or god if you prefer. Generate appreciation for the divinity of what you're looking at, a divine essence that you share intimately with it.

Now that you've created an energy of appreciation for one particular thing or being, I'd like you to expand that feeling to include more of what you see, even to include everything you see around you. See and feel the beauty in all things, all people, all that's happening around you. Generate that sensation of seeing something magical and beautiful, no matter what you're looking at. Appreciate the tiniest details from the largest perspective. Don't get lost in thinking about and evaluating what aspect of something you can appreciate. Simply feel the appreciation for each and every aspect no matter what - that's all that matters. Finally, expand that feeling of appreciation to include yourself, all life, all experience, and all the universe around you. Continue generating this energy for a few more moments (pause here).

Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his book "Flow" suggests that feelings of happiness are found in those moments where one becomes completely immersed in an activity, and that those who experience the most happiness in life are therefore the ones who frequently engage in activities that absorb all there attention - such as athletes, musicians, or anyone that really loves and becomes immersed in their work. Now, what constitutes happiness is debatable, but a definite sense of joy or freedom does come in that flowing state of consciousness. However, to achieve that state, it's not really necessary to find activities or tasks that you love doing if you can instead learn to love everything you do. And an excellent approach to reaching this sensation of flow is to generate the energy of appreciation as you're going about your daily activities. No matter what you're doing, try channeling appreciation to anyone or anything that you wish - to yourself, to any sensations that you notice in your body, to anyone you're spending time with, to the food you're eating, to a leaf on the ground or a cloud you see drifting by. Generate appreciation for anything that you see, smell, touch, taste or feel in your present moment. This is an excellent approach to fully entering the present moment and experiencing a flowing consciousness in every moment. When you do this, your day becomes like a living meditation, with your focus on the beauty of the moment. Appreciating the perfection, imperfection, divinity and humanness of yourself and your interaction with everything around you. Experiment with this concept and you'll probably find your old routines becoming immensely more enjoyable - like an injection of pure life energy into every moment.

Okay, if you've lost track of the energy now, I'd like you to bring it back again by thinking of whatever thought or idea inspires appreciation for you, and then expand it again as much as you can.

Now, transfer that feeling of appreciation onto not just the things you see in your immediate environment, but onto all the good things that you currently have in your life. Anything that you value. Perhaps friends or loved ones in your life, any money that you have, any healthy part of your body, any knowledge or special memories from the past. We spend a lot of time focusing on things that we'd like to fix or improve about our lives, but for this moment I want you to simply put all that aside and appreciate anything that you currently have. Even if you only have enough money to buy your next meal, or enough air for your next breath, those are things to appreciate. In fact, you can probably find hundreds of more significant things that are good about your life. If you want to attract more, realize first that abundance is drawn by the body energies of abundance, and the best way to start attracting more of those good things is to first feel appreciation for all the good things that you already have. This energy reinforces their presence in your experience. It's quite similar to the energy of gratitude that we worked with earlier, and you might want to merge the energy of gratitude with appreciation if you wish. Either way, please take a few more moments now to generate these feelings for anything you consider good about your life (pause here).

Next, take that energy of appreciation and gratitude for the good things in your life, and transfer it to the things that you want in your life but don’t yet have. The things that you desire to draw into your life. Generate appreciation for those things or conditions as if they were already part of your experience, as if you already had them. This is what you might call "pre-appreciation". It's an energy that you can use to attract relationships, greater wealth, health, or anything that you desire into your life. All you do is decide what you would like, and then generate the inner energy of appreciation toward it as if it were already there. Project that feeling with the belief that what you’re appreciating is the way your life is now - in the present moment. Appreciation, being quite similar to unconditional love, is a highly charged energy that will quickly draw whatever external form you associate with the energy as you generate it. So rather than generate feelings of longing or worry, which only attract lack, it makes much more sense to appreciate the thing or condition you desire as if it's already with you. Please try this for a few more moments now (pause here).

Generating appreciation as an approach to manifestation allows you to attract the future that you desire without losing your ability to appreciate the present moment. In this way, you don't fall victim to hoping, longing, or wishing your life away. You can keep moving toward a condition's physical manifestation, while already feeling its completion. Remember to practice ignoring outer appearances as you generate this or any energy of manifestation. If you look at outer conditions, and react to what you observe, your inner energy state becomes a reflection of what you already have and you just get more of that condition. But if you can appreciate your life as you wish it to be, with complete disregard for your current appearances, you'll have found the power to redefine your reality.
 

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