Joyfulness Broadcast

Can life feel effortless and easy? Explore that in today's episode. As we discover all the expectations and resistance we carry within ourselves, we can start to recognise that effort doesn't exist "out there". Instead, when things feel hard and difficult - at least on an emotional level - we can trace the root within our own minds. It is the resistance that makes things feel hard. As this is gently released, life becomes easier and far more enjoyable. In fact, we discover that our inner most nature is effortless and peaceful.

Beyond ideas, concepts, memories, and imagination, there is just this pure presence of awareness. Thoughtless. Desireless. Free and Formless. This is what you already are - your pure essence. It sounds foreign to the degree we have come to believe that we are a limited individuals with thoughts, viewpoints, and opinions. But is that what you are? Let's explore this together.

Each moment we drop trying to push life to happen for us, we re-discover that life is here with us and for us. That what we are is inseparable from life. We can build up our surrender muscle with just small things every day. Missed the bus - could I allow that and let go into life as it is now? Dropped a coffee mug. Lost a shoe. How much could we surrender? The more we do, the more at peace we are. Peace and surrender are one and the same thing. 

We tend to spend so much time and energy on wanting without realising that it's possible to have without wanting. Here's what I mean by that - wanting implies lack of. As an energy, wanting is a sense of lack. Whilst having is a sense of being whole and having it all. So, counter-intuitively, we can actually let go of the feeling of wanting something and instead welcome the sense that we are already complete and whole now. How do we do this? One way, is to simply notice that the presence of awareness is already total and complete. It goes no-where. Does nothing. Is always present. It is always whole. Living more from this place, life becomes far more fulfilling and easy-going.

In this episode, we've got an awesome conversation with Anne Murphy. Anne is one of those high-achieving folks very passionate about what she does however, that came at a price for most of her life. The high expectations also came with self-loathing until a turning point whilst back-country solo hiking. Anne shared how there simply was not time for self-loathing and how there was a requirement to focus on just completing the next task as it needed to be done. I can see how there is a simple peace to that - just doing the next thing as it needs to be done and letting the stones fall where they may. I hope you enjoy this conversation.

At the heart of every problem we have is "me". What tends to happen is a thought arises such as "I'm angry at Bob" and is believed in or bought into. It's sort of like believing a movie or show we are watching to be real and forgetting that it's just a show. Well, what we tend to do is forget that thoughts are just thoughts and feelings are just feelings. Instead, we habitually treat them as having real substance to them and believe that they are referring to a real character called "me". So, in this episode, we will play around a little with this so-called "me" and see if we can come to discover some helpful things about this character. Like perhaps, the possibility that this "me" is entirely made-up... 

If problems were forgotten, would they persist? A curious discovery is that problems exist only as memories of the past. At this exact moment, there is nothing to say or comment about. There is nothing to think about. Don't think about this statement too much, just pause deeply right now and notice without commenting. This episode is an experimental guided problem dissolution thingy. I hope you enjoy it and I would love to hear your feedback - how did it go for you? You can email nick@joyfulness.live to share feedback - it is very helpful and much appreciated.

A topic close to my heart. If we, collectively speaking, want to change the way we treat the earth, we must change the way we see it. Right now, it is very rare to see the earth as sacred. Few truly recognise the divinity of nature. When we are blind to the sacredness of nature and of life, we treat it accordingly. For me, the most important part of having healthy forests, clean streets with lots of trees, flowers, birds and insects, and helping mitigate the extremes of weather, is to return to our hearts and recognise our own divinity. When we see our own divinity, we see the divinity of nature. We then treat it as such.  Please share this episode with those who may be receptive and open to listening. With love... Nick

At this moment, what is blocking the overwhelming gratitude of realising "I am"? For most of us, our attention is restless and always fluctuating between thoughts of the past of future. Our attention rarely settles and notices that which is obvious... such as the fact that "I exist". In this episode let's see if we can unravel the obstacles to that gratitude so that you can experience it for yourself!

In this episode, we got Jeff Peroutka with us for a fun conversation about life. Jeff is 23 and runs two successful businesses, an impressive dude! But he is also a human just like all of us and that's what I really like about chatting with these awesome people. It shows us that they are just like us and that we can do what they do if we want to! Then it becomes a matter of discovering what we really want and what we thought we wanted but didn't actually. Jeff shares some recent experiences he had where there was quite clearly a miraculous intervention. As you listen, pay attention to the meaning behind the words. Notice how an increased intensity and sincerity of prayer resulted in a rather miraculous event. See what you can learn from this conversation and enjoy!

There is probably a lot more anger within us than we realise. If we take this to be true and it turns out to not be, then we don't really lose anything. If it turns out to be true, we are able to deal with it more gracefully and consciously. The way I deal with anger is the way I deal with anything, primarily through prayer and openness - I always try to be as open and willing as I can be to becoming aware of that which I am not yet aware of. This helps me a lot. When intense anger arose just recently, this approach allowed me to watch it come and go without acting from it. As an experiment, however, I opened myself to playing out this anger vocally. I felt the viciousness of the anger intensify and then just dissipate. I did not express it to anyone. This is an important point to make. Expressing anger is not something that I find helpful. I find it much more helpful to just witness and allow the coming and going of the anger energy. I thought I'd share some things I've learnt about anger in this episode.

Past life research can be very helpful in re-framing feelings in the light of a deeper understanding. One can see how having this aha moment tends to be very releasing and automatically results in acceptance of a feeling as it becomes perfectly clear where it came from. In this episode, I'll just share the ways I'm familiar with researching our past lives. This is still an ongoing area of exploration for me but I thought I'd share this information so you may know this is an option and explore it further if you so choose.

Dreams. Memes. And time machines! What do they have in common? I don't know! But I do know that we spend a lot of time asleep in dreamland. Wouldn't it be cool if we could use that time to learn about ourselves and deepen in understanding of the human condition. Well, that's what I love to do anyway! In this episode, I'll share the key insights to understand that will allow you to understand that approach I take which helps me tremendously! Tune in to learn and grow together! I'm just making this all up as I go and would love for you to join me in this adventure!

Listening has been something that I have had to re-learn and continue to deepen in. I've had to nurture it within myself. It's not something I was taught growing up. For me, it really took feeling like someone cared for me - that pure love of just listening with no agenda - to start caring about myself and others in a deeper way. So, when someone recently came across as rather self-focused and not interested in others, I was able to empathise on an experiential level and happily provided a listening ear out of care and compassion.

How many times have we chosen something that really seemed like a good idea at the time but later, turned out not to go the way we expected? We are limited to seeing things the way we see them. We choose what makes sense to us at the time and then punish ourselves for not seeing things differently. But if we could see things differently and if another better option was apparent to us, we would choose it. Yet the fact that a mistake was made implies that we didn't know any better, or else we wouldn't have chosen it. We choose what we think is best. We often get it wrong. Often extremely wrong.

A feeling is a composition of sensations. The mind then comes in and attempts to label the experience. Stories are generated to rationalise or explain away the feeling. It's like the intellect will only allow it if it fits into the story it has about everything... So what does a feeling mean? Is that the right question? Perhaps a better question is where is that question coming from? Could we just accept feelings without having to attach a story to what is being experienced?

Every choice we make is something we have to bear the weight of. Every choice has a consequence. Some choices lead to a lot of heaviness. Other choices uplift and support us and those around us. The more inclusive the upliftment of the choices we make are, the more uplifted we all feel and the less suffering is possible. There's a lot we can talk about with this topic but before we do - in future episodes - it's good to first cover the feelings that can come when we realise that we are both accountable for every choice and simultaneously rather limited in what we can see; often something that seems like a good idea turns out not to be. In this episode, we will cover an effective approach to dealing with any anxiety and fear which that may bring up within us.

The Holy Spirit uplifts me on the wings of grace. I float through life with increasing reliance on Divinity. The more I depend upon Divinity, the more ease and grace enters my life. This is an option for you as well. In this episode, I share a story that to me articulates key principles by which one can live a graceful and joyous life.

It's a powerful question to ask. We tend to hold onto and cling to things that we get something out of. By asking this question and being open and receptive to whatever might come-up, we empower ourselves to become aware of what it is we get, for example, out of our relationships. Often we seek the feeling of being wanted, of being loved, of being understood. When this is in awareness, we can then further inquire and ask ourselves why we want this. Often it comes from a feeling of lack within which, if not recognised, will degrade the quality of all our relationships through hidden agendas and attachments. As this "getting-ness" surfaces in awareness, it becomes possible to let go and own the source of all that we previously taught to get from outside ourselves, from within ourselves. With a greater sense of inner completion comes greater inner freedom and a newfound capacity to enjoy our relationships for what they are without any anxiety or stress involved.

Eric is back! This episode is golden with lots of snippets of wisdom to digest, take-in, and be with. One of the most powerful topics that interweaved the whole chat was that of re-framing. This is when we re-contextualise and re-perceive something so that we see it differently. What is interesting is that all problems can be dissolved via reframing. Why is there a problem? Re-framing dissolves the foundation of the problem and reveals that there was never a problem. It can reveal the hidden-gifts of even the most challenging situations and in doing so, uplift us with the realisation that we can choose how we see any given situation. We can choose whether we make the most of it or whether we see it as a curse.