threshold

“A single event can awaken within us a stranger totally unknown to us. To live is to be slowly born.” Antoine de Saint-Exupery

So what makes us decide change is necessary? Most of us go through life on autopilot just accepting and reinforcing what we were told about ourselves and the world, but some of us do not. At some point in our lives, some people have an experience that forces them to either question what they are doing or why they do what they do. At some point, some of us just don’t feel comfortable believing the same things we were trained to believe.

It is this moment that Bill Harris, the mastermind of the Centerpointe Research Institute and the brain behind Holosync* technology, refers to as threshold. I strongly suggest you add everything he creates to your personal development program. He explains how everything has a threshold. A threshold is a limit. I have one, you have one, the car has one, your shirt has one and so on. When a threshold has been reached one of two things can happen. It can cease to exist or restructure and be as something different. When your shirt has reached its threshold with worn holes in it, you can throw it away or turn it into a rag to clean with. When your car has reached its threshold it will stop working. A junkyard will trash it or turn it into something else by recycling its parts. When you have reached your threshold in a relationship, you can leave or readjust. The same goes for your job or profession. When you can’t continue living as you do, you can stop living or find a different way to exist. I strongly suggest the latter, but the point is that everything has a threshold.

I will never forget sitting in the courtroom once upon a time. In front of the judge were a married couple and their attorneys. They were there because of a restraining order that she wanted to drop. When the judge heard her ask to drop the restraining order and looked confused. He stopped looking at his paperwork and just looked at her in disbelief. The courtroom was silent. After what seemed like a long time, he picked the papers up again and began to read out loud why she had originally filed the restraining order. She had been held hostage in her own home for days with the threat of being shot if she left, by her husband. He tortured her. She wanted to forgive him and drop the restraining order she had just gotten only a week prior.

The judge stopped reading the list of offenses and said something that had stuck with me since. He said, “Everyone has a point of no return. Some women leave after being abused once, some leave 5 years in and some 20. They all leave. Unfortunately some are forced to leave by the hand of the abuser before they have the sense to leave.” He did not grant her the dismissal of the restraining order. I cried for her.

That judge understood threshold. Everyone has one and they are all different. You can understand why they are all different because you understand that we are all made up of different interpretations of our experiences, right? Both of those people were working with an internal hard drive (unconscious) that had been combined with all of the input they had gathered through their lives. Both of them saw life from a different place, different expectations, different reasoning. What he reportedly had done to his wife was appalling to me at the time, but the question is, what was he exposed to that made him think it was ok do behave in such a way? And her too, what had she been exposed to believe that it was ok for her to drop the restraining order? We cannot judge based on our perception of the world. We are built with different wiring and the programming possibilities are limitless.

Although our wiring is different, we all have a threshold and the ability to change how we see and experience things. Some people experience threshold earlier in life, and some much later. Have you ever noticed the after effect of a traumatic experience in someone’s life? Have you or someone you know gone through a divorce or had a bad accident or recovered from an addiction? Perhaps you are or know of someone who has suddenly lost a job or a loved one.

I would like to illustrate threshold by reminding you of a celebrity that is pretty publicly watched. A few years ago, Brittany Spears went through a very public, very difficult break up with her husband and father of two children. We were inundated with “news” of the court proceedings, private details and the behaviors of both parties. Then we watched, as the pop star seemed to change. She changed physically, gaining some weight and shaving her hair, we were told of different behavior. She was going out and partying. To those watching she just lost it. She was no longer the star she was. But the truth that I see is that she had reached her threshold. Her life was no longer able to function the way it had been and she was going through a period of recovery and discovery. She was recovering from a big loss.

That recovering led her to much discovery about who she was, who she is and how she wanted to be. Today we have the pop star back but different than before. Her world has shifted and she is living a new life, with new perspectives and goals. It was all nothing more than part of her process.

Reaching a threshold is important to the development of your life. Breaking through to the other side of that threshold is what allows you to live with a new perspective. It is an adjustment to the creation of you.

When I first began holding Meeting of the Mind discussion groups this was a topic that always got great response. It doesn’t matter HOW it happened. It matters more THAT it happened. It is a way to confirm and reassure that whatever is happening in your life needs to happen. You wouldn’t be who you are, thinking as you think, believing what you believe, without these seemingly “bad” events. I have heard people say, ‘things happen for a reason’, but this is a much deeper concept.

As we move throughout our journey we sometimes get “stuck” in a place that prevents us from moving toward a place where we could be thriving-our purpose. If we ignore the signs and opportunities that present themselves, the universe has a funny way of making it happen for us. Think back to a difficult event in your life. Think about the expectation you put into that event. Think about the energy. Think about the resistance. Did your expectations or energy or resistance make it stop happening? My guess is no. Eckhart Tolle, in A New Earth, explains how resistance needs resistance; it keeps the struggle alive. When you stop resisting something it stops.

Remember that every single event adds to the creation of who we are and where we are headed. This information allows you to acknowledge when something happens that you don’t feel good about and then find something that is positive in it. Sometimes it is very difficult, especially in the beginning, to think of something positive. I understand this very well. What worked for me and what I have my clients do is have a “go to” thought.

Think of something that makes you smile. It could be a memory or a person or an event- anything. Close your eyes and picture it using as many senses as you can. Go ahead and do that. Did you smile? Did it feel good? If not go back and think about it in more detail or pick something else. It should be something that provokes a smile. Write down a memory or thought that makes you smile. Use as many details as possible (all of your senses).

That is your “go to” thought. Use it whenever something bothers you. Whenever you feel yourself omitting bad energy-whenever you have a pain in your gut or your heart or your head, use this thought to make you smile. The more you do it the easier it will be and soon you will feel good more than you feel not good.

I gave up being a victim of circumstance when I started doing this. Regardless of what was going on in my world, if I took a second to imagine my “go to” thought I would feel better. My thought was, and has been, of my daughter running up to greet me at the end of a long work day smiling and yelling, “…Mommy!!!!!!” It puts a smile on my face and fills my heart with overwhelming love. I cannot feel bad while I think of that moment.

Take some time to perfect a “go to” thought. Teach your children how to create a “go to” thought. Tell your friends and family about creating a “go to” thought. It is a gift of awareness and relief. It is a life vest during the storm. It is a moment of happiness that has unlimited possibilities. Much love.