In the Lifebook Membership, we focus on one aspect of life each month. May happens to be the spiritual month in the cycle. Last year my spiritual goals for the month were to be more relaxed, confident, curious, and happy. Of course, they are a focus this month too. Who doesn’t want those things? But, this month, more than anything, I need to focus on strengthening my faith.
Why Focus On Faith?
One of my premises in Lifebook for spirituality is this:
Faith gives life more meaning.
Faith is my gasoline in life. Having faith is what keeps me going. It’s one of the most important aspects of my life.
For example:
- I’ve never been a religious person, but I have faith that there is more out there than what we see and that this life isn’t the only thing we have going for us. That’s important to me. If I believed that this was it, that would be really depressing to me.
- I have faith that things tend to work out in your favor if you put the work and effort in and keep taking one step at a time forward.
- Faith in myself is what keeps me going in my career and personal development.
- I have faith that even the shittiest things that happen are meant to teach you something or could be beneficial in your life in some way.
But, my overall faith tank is on low right now. I’ve been having so many crappy things happen to me in the past year that my faith has been wheezing out of me.
Lately, it seems as though something causes me to go one step forward, and then something else happens that takes me two steps back.
Like most people in the pandemic, we’ve racked up some debt this past year. We went from no debt besides a mortgage to quite a bit of debt.
My husband can’t find a job. He’s a contractor and normally he can get a job right away, but it’s been a while now with no success.
My mental and physical health has been acting up in ways I’ve never experienced before. For instance, I developed alopecia last October, a breast cyst last year, anxiety last year, and an ovarian cyst this year. I’m actively working on ensuring my health improves, but without faith that things can get better, why bother?
Things keep getting changed or taken away with companies I’m an affiliate with. I would say this is one of the biggest stressors for me. When you spend years putting a ton of time, energy, and money into your business and then start to feel like you can lose everything in a moment, it’s a huge weight on your shoulders. The more bad things that happen, the more your faith in success takes a nosedive. At least that’s been my experience lately.
In short, my faith in many things is dwindling and it’s hard to see the good when you feel like you are losing hope for so many things.
I’ve also found that when your faith dwindles in one area, it dwindles in all areas.
That’s why I need to focus on building my faith back up. I can’t let my faith tank get to empty. Without out, I will give up on a lot of things in my life and turn into someone who I don’t want to be.
My Habits To Develop More Faith
There are many things I can do to develop more faith. I’m sure that a lot of what I do without the intent to develop more faith will help me regardless. But, there are 4 things that I’m actively going to do to develop more faith and fill up that tank.
1. Reflecting On The Times That Things Have Worked Out
It’s been easy for me to get stuck thinking about all the times things have failed and then spend way too much time envisioning that happening in the future. Of course, I imagine horrible things happening because that’s what my imagination can do. It can visualize all sorts of diseases and plagues and losses – and it’s not a pretty future. It’s really hard to keep the faith with those visuals floating around in my head.
That’s why I’m going to spend at least 30 minutes a day reflecting on times when things have worked out for me. When it comes to relationships, health, money, career, and more, there have been plenty of times where things have worked out amazingly, and I need to write those things down and remember them.
I also need to write down all the things that work out in my present day. I need to keep the light shining on them.
2. Writing Down Answers And Signs
I do pray a lot. It’s a habit that I was taught as a kid, and it’s still something I do today for comfort, especially when I’m desperate. But I also do it when I feel good. It’s just something I naturally do.
However, I haven’t been keeping my eyes open for answers and signs. I’ve been so focused on what’s wrong, I can’t see the things that come into my life that are valuable or have promise for my future.
I’m going to start a journal and reflect on my prayers as well as the answers and signs that I get throughout the day.
3. Reading Success Stories
It’s interesting how quickly you can find failure stories out there. They seem to stand out.
For instance, I couldn’t find many success stories when it came to growing back my hair after it fell out. There were a couple, but for the most part, people were losing their hair and learning how to deal with it – which is a success story in itself I suppose. However, I wanted to hear from people who have gone through what I went through and came out the other end with hair!
I have spent countless hours crying and feeling bad for others as I’ve researched my struggles and come across heartache and struggles and a bunch of other crap. And that has been a huge part in sucking the faith out of me.
I need to find success stories and focus on those. I need to read articles and books by people who have succeeded. I need to be more involved with positive online communities and less involved with the tragedies on Twitter and Facebook.
4. Stick To My Monthly Goals And Habits
I’m currently doing a program called Mindset. Wow, do I love it. I’m working through the anxiety audios and there is one sentence that keeps sticking out in my mind.
The best way to predict the future is to create it.
This morning it hit me especially hard. It’s a sentence that gives me hope because I know what I want in my future thanks to Lifebook and I just need to stick to the plan so that I can create it.
I had started my yearly goals in January, but some health issues caused me to fail miserably in the first quarter. Besides becoming a better vegan and lucid dreamer, nothing has really progressed in my life since January. In April, I decided I was going to start over and begin my year in May. So, technically this is the first quarter of my year… and things are on track.
No matter what happens, I need to stick with my goals and habits and keep moving forward because as things develop and work out, I will undoubtedly add more faith to my tank.
