Thresholds: What are they and how do they limit your expansion?
Do you ever find that you reach a certain level of happiness or success before you spiral back to feelings of doubt, stress, limitation or fear? Then a while later, you feel optimistic again until you get close to a new level of happiness or success, only to feel down again the next week.
If so, you’ve reached a threshold (pattern) that you’re used to and will likely replicate until you see what is happening and commit to another way.
It may be hard to imagine you’d limit your own happiness and have a glass ceiling! But it’s easy to do, because we become habitual beings until we choose to awaken.
Enlightenment, spiritual growth, busting through limits – these are really about entering a new space in your awareness that helps you step out of the patterns that have you feel stuck. Once you exit the pattern, you will feel greater freedom, power, and joy. And very importantly, you will take new action. Life wont’ be “perfect” but it will be alive and you won’t get blindsighted by challenges or difficulties that used to get you down.
I work with clients who exhibit this. At one point during the coaching, they’re lit up, excited about what’s next and hopeful. Then sometimes they slide back into “no, it’s not possible, don’t you see why I’m stuck, I have no control!…” If they’ve blocked their dreams over months or years, then of course it’s natural to do a back’n’forth initially. Fortunately we can work through this so they can get out of it.
If they are exploring coaching and not a client yet, I offer the choice and ask them if they desire to create change. Some do say “no”. They are not ready or willing yet. Others see that they’re stepping back once again from what they want, awaken to their pattern, and say “yes”, choosing to shift.
Thresholds are really tricky creatures to catch on your own unless you meditate or learn to watch yourself and witness your thoughts. And even then, we all can fall victim to them really easily because they’re patterns we’ve been practicing through our entire life.
We have a choice as adults to grow into a new level of awareness and to me, that is so exciting. That new level of awareness allows me to play in an arena that I find more soulful, fulfilling, and celebratory. It is a space where I get to “be me”. It is a profound experience to be oneself in a world in which we’re constantly told who we should be, what we should think, how we should live. Quite exhausting!
We must look at our thresholds and see them for what they are, a temporary obstacle that is actually an illusion. The more we believe in our limitations, the stronger they become. When we let go, we can find another way.
We have to allow ourselves more happiness in order to experience it. We have to give ourselves permission to be successful and joyful and fulfilled and that takes courage. But I believe everyone is capable of making that choice.
Examples of threshold conversations:
- I can’t do “x” until I have “y”. (‘x’ may be time, $, relationship, job)
- It’s not possible.
- I am not like you/him/her…I don’t have…
- You don’t understand… (I am an exception to all rules which means “I don’t get what I want but everyone else can”)
- There’s someone to blame for the way I am (parents, teachers…), so I am powerless…
- It’s the ‘taxman’, the corporations, the political system, the economy…
- I have to follow my family/cultural expectations no matter what…
- If I change, I will lose my current status, state, identity…
- I don’t want to step into the unknown, I’d rather be safe (and sorry).
- If I really do what I want, “so-and-so” won’t love me.
- I’m afraid I’ll lose my friendships/relationship if I am successful.
- One day when “x” happens, I’ll be free to make the choice I desire.
- I just had a success, so there must be a coming failure to ‘balance’ it.
I encourage you to look at where you hold yourself back from your full joy. Where is it ok for things to be as they are instead of the way you desire? Where is it ok to say ‘no’ instead of the true ‘yes’? Where do you stop? Where do you create limits that appear so real that you stop? Where are you not willing to do the work required?
Step beyond a threshold today and allow yourself to move forward to what you really want. You can say “yes” before you think you’re fully ready. In fact, that’s the way it’s always been.
Your Turn
To discuss coaching with me for the new year, book a free consultation. Contact me at info@joiworks.com. Everyone registering in December will receive a bonus for stepping forward before the new year!
