Published:
11/16/2010 05:06pm
Forget the Gloomy Economic News — Take Action!
Like me, you probably read the news that our unemployment rate rose to 9.8 percent in September, a 26-year high, as U.S. employers cut 263,000 jobs.
You may also be scratching your head over why economists predict sluggish economic growth for years while declaring the recession “over.”
Without minimizing hardships faced by millions of Americans who are out of work, let’s we put aside these gloomy headlines for a moment. Ask yourself what can you do to improve your economy?
One answer comes from Huna, the ancient Hawaiian understanding of energy, healing and life that I teach and have learned through my lineage and experience. In short, it says each individual is responsible for creating their reality. We must therefore focus on intentionally taking action to better our lives rather than worrying about things over which we have no control.
I was teaching a workshop in San Diego when a guy raised his hand and said he was “grumpy” because he didn’t have the job he wanted. So we spent a little time looking at his situation.
In Huna, I teach people to let go of negative emotions and limiting decisions. In this guy’s case, “grumpy” was a definite negative emotion. He did not even realize how his attitude was limiting his ability to find work. So we did the work, helping him identify his negative emotions and limiting beliefs.
I asked him to write down all the things that were not going well that he did not want in his life, and all the things he wanted in his life. Under things he wanted, he wrote down details of the high tech job he sought, the pay, etc.
We then discussed how he could go about getting that job using the “S.M.A.R.T” model I teach as part of Huna training. This means we evaluate our goals based upon these characterisics:
S Specific
M Measurable
A Achievable
R Resources
T Toward what you want.
I asked the job seeker what he would need to do to generate the job he was looking for in San Diego. His response was unique. He said the job doesn’t exist here — the industry collapsed and it’s no longer here.
So here’s this guy who has been living off his savings and complaining for a year. It’s like living in a desert and complaining it doesn’t rain a lot.
Going through the exercise of getting him to write down exactly what he wanted and did not want brought out a bunch of negative emotions and limiting decisions. He was angry and frustrated that the job he wanted was not where he lived, but hadn’t seriously thought about moving or even commuting. He asked me how Huna could fix his dilemma. I responded that Huna would say “move!”
He looked shocked. “I thought you could do something with Huna,“ he said. I asked him, "do you think Huna is going to create an industry in a market that doesn’t have that industry?”
I also asked him where he would have to go to find the job he wanted. His answer: 45 minutes north of San Diego in Newport Beach. I felt like a parent looking at a child with the answer in front of him. I Iooked at him lovingly and said: “Dude, move. It’s not a complicated fix.”
The lesson here: Don’t look for others to fix you. It’s easy to fall into that trance-like state that people are walking around in — thinking that the world is an awful place and someone else can fix you. It all begins and ends with you. Sometimes it is just the fact that you live in the desert. Are you willing to move?
My friend from the workshop in San Diego did. He moved to Newport Beach and ended up getting an amazing, fulfilling job. On the weekends he went back to San Diego and enjoyed the pleasures that were there.
A lot of us make New Year’s resolutions each year. In fact, January is designated Be On Purpose Month. I suggest we not just dedicate a month to this idea, but think about it every moment, every day. And remember: If you live in the desert, you can’t complain about the lack of rain.
