I want to introduce you to the concept of the AAA approach to abundance.
Now I'm going to break each component down and talk you through how you can implement these into your life.
But the basic summary is that if you want to live a happy,
Successful and content life,
An abundant life,
You need to do the following things.
The first is to acknowledge the reality of the situation.
What is actually happening?
Then you need to act upon where you can.
So you look at what's happening and then you take action.
And for the things that you can't change,
The things that you can't act upon,
You need to accept.
So when you acknowledge,
Act and accept,
You will find that your life significantly increases towards the positive.
So let's break these components down.
The first one is the acknowledgement of reality as it stands.
There's a real temptation to daydream,
To future plan,
To ruminate on the past,
To be anxious about the future.
Basically to not live in the present moment.
But through mindfulness meditation,
Through introspection,
Through consideration,
Through just sheer force of will,
We can put ourselves into the present moment.
Now this is a practice that we are all currently going through.
The idea is to remove the illusion of our mind and just put us into the moment.
So when we practice meditation and return our focus back to the breath,
Back to the breath,
Back to the breath,
Or whatever our practice is focusing on,
We're training our mind to live in the present moment.
Now living in the present moment goes far beyond just the observation of the breath.
It goes into the acceptance of reality for what it is as it is right now.
We have to acknowledge what is happening.
We can try and put our head in the sand and ignore the relationship issues,
Ignore the work issues,
Ignore the health issues,
And sort of just kick the ball down the line and hope that in the future it will just resolve itself.
But unfortunately that sort of behavior has probably been the thing that's gotten us to where we are now.
A far better approach is to acknowledge the reality of the situation.
If something isn't right in our lives,
It's not going to get better unless we take action to make it get better.
It's not going to get better on its own.
Further still,
It might actually be impacting us.
If we are turning away from it,
If we're not accepting it,
If we're not acknowledging it,
We may find that it's still there under the surface impacting us.
I have a history of past trauma and quite a challenging childhood.
I moved out of home quite early and this has led to a variety of mental health concerns that have been continuously uncovered.
Now in the past,
I consciously and subconsciously pulled away from it.
I put my head in the sand and I dissociated.
It kept me alive and focused and surviving in the moment,
But now I'm dealing with the ramifications.
I'm having to sort of dig it back up and work through it,
Acknowledge what happened and acknowledge what happened and acknowledge what happened and acknowledge what happened and how the things that happened are impacting me to this day.
Acknowledge the emotionality,
The grief,
Feelings,
The anger,
Acknowledge the loss,
All of the things that happened.
But if I don't,
Those feelings,
Those things that happened are still subconsciously impacting me.
The first step towards abundance is to acknowledge what is actually happening in your life right now.
This is both positive and negative by the way.
Acknowledge the small wins,
Acknowledge the daily routines,
Acknowledge your meditation practice,
Acknowledge the love in your life,
But also don't turn away from the bad.
There's something that I've noticed through meditation that when I turn and face,
When I fully embrace and accept the feelings that I'm having,
They tend to dissipate.
They tend to reduce in duration and intensity and frequency.
Basically what that means is if I'm feeling anger or jealousy or resentment or any sort of negative emotion,
When I turn and look at it and embrace it and actually feel it rather than running from it,
It tends to go away quite quickly.
So interestingly,
Just turning and facing and just acknowledging what is happening in the moment actually can help to fix that moment.
The next step is to take action.
We know through an acknowledgement of reality what's actually happening,
But let's take a look and take action.
Now taking action will involve basically doing what we can,
Where we can,
To impact the world,
To change ourselves,
To do something,
To improve our lot in life.
The general principle of self-improvement is to choose the long-term option.
So it would be far more preferable to sit on the couch,
But can you do a little bit of exercise?
Can you do a little bit of reading rather than watching a TV show?
Can you choose a healthier option to eat?
Can you choose a better portion size?
Can you reduce the amount of intoxicants that you're consuming?
The basic idea being that the more consistently you choose the long-term over the short-term,
The better your life will be.
Self-improvement,
Personal development is a long,
Long,
Long-term game.
It's not something that you can just do for a week and then just be done with.
It involves small incremental changes in growth throughout the lifespan across all the various aspects of your life,
From your physical health,
To your diet,
To your mental health,
To your spiritual practice,
To your personal relationships and finances.
The basic idea is that you're going to look at where you are and take action to address the issues.
Now this isn't saying that you should go all out and make massive changes all at once,
Because that's not sustainable.
That's not acknowledging the reality of your life.
A small personal example is with exercise.
When I first started training,
I could barely run a kilometer and I could do no more than three push-ups in a row.
And now I'm able to train twice per day every day.
And my fitness and strength is miles beyond where I began.
But if I was to train the way I do now,
Initially,
I would have blown myself out.
The same is true for education,
For my meditation,
And for a variety of other aspects of my life.
It's something that I love.
It's small incremental growth,
Small incremental changes that will get you there.
The final part of the AAA approach to abundance is acceptance.
There are just some things in life that you simply can't change.
In fact,
Most of life you can't change.
And for those things,
You have to accept it.
This could be personal disability or injury.
This could be grief or loss.
This could be world events.
Now,
To be clear,
There's nuance to have here.
I'm not saying just accept people's abuse.
That's why we talked about the taking action.
Obviously,
Take action to ensure the best approach to your life.
And part of that action that you are taking is to accept what you have to accept.
Most things,
No matter how good they are,
Will have some aspect that isn't so pleasurable,
That isn't so desirable.
Those things you have to accept.
We are all subject to the passing of time.
We are all subject to the loss of loved ones.
We're all subject to the impacts of old age.
We will all eventually pass.
We all have to earn a living.
You know,
There's these things that we just have to accept about life.
The fact that we are a human creature living at this time,
In this age,
We have to accept it.
So part of the practice is learning how to accept this.
Once again,
I turn back to the practices of meditation.
When you practice mindfulness meditation,
You turn the camera inwards,
You look,
And you just see things for what they are.
And then you learn to accept them.
There might be a bit of pain,
There might be a bit of emotionality,
There might be a bit of something,
But you just sit with it and you grow comfortable with it.
And over time,
You develop this practice of acceptance.
And then it starts to transfer off the mat into real life.
The person that you get annoyed by won't be as annoying.
The situations that are frustrating become less so.
The little nuances and idiosyncrasies and issues that you have,
You just sort of learn to accept them.
Now this isn't saying that you're going to be a pushover,
That you'll let people treat you like a doormat.
By all means not so much.
But it's more that you're just accepting reality as it is.
So once you've acknowledged things how they are,
Taken action where you can,
And accepted where you can't,
You'll find that your life is increasingly abundant.
This is basically where things in your life just kind of gel.
You'll feel this synergy,
This growth,
This momentum,
And you'll find that things just sort of sync up and start working.
The main reason for this abundance is that you find that you're living a value-driven life.
A life in which your actions are in line with what you want,
And in line with who you are,
And in line with the reality of your worldly situation.
And there's this sort of seamlessness.
And you'll find that over time things just compound,
And you'll find yourself all of a sudden in a position living the life with the mental state that you've always wanted.
And once again,
When you find yourself there,
Go back through the process.
Acknowledge that you've made it.
Accept the reality of your situation,
And continue to take further action towards future growth.
And from there,
More abundance will follow.
