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Ways to measure your own growth now
 Q: Am I growing? How can I measure it?
A: I’ve found two good ways to measure progress in personal growth, tools shared with me by John-Roger of MSIA.org, http://johnroger.org
1) Measure your progress not by how many times you fall down.
Rather, measure your progress by how quickly you get back up again, once you do fall down.
2) Conceive of spiritual growth as a two-fold thing, as both what level you are contacting; and, how often you contact it.
This suggests a person aligning them self with the highest frequency they can reach, on a daily basis, grows more quickly, than someone established at a higher frequency who only aligns them self once a week. Exercise whatever contact with Spirit I have. If I practice, I will grow.
What is growth?
Growth is any movement, individual evaluated, that augments the fulfillment of any of our five human needs,
* Security
* Fun
* Freedom to pursue your goals and dreams
* Power (influence with peers)
* Belonging (intimacy).
For a while, between about 1970 and 1985, personal growth and spiritual growth were imagined to be distinct and different things.
, where you helped the poor, asked people to sign petitions for political change, worked for the Peace Corps; and, spiritual growth, where you went inside to connect with your own Divinity, Since 1985, the illusion has dissolved and growth is again one thing, personal-spiritual growth.
We all have also many images of growth from the plant kingdom.
In terms of self-healing, imagery of waking and sleeping serve us best. "Growth" is conveniently imaged as waking up. Personal ignorance is conveniently imaged as "being asleep." These bring us closer to what we do to grow consciously; we wake up sub- and unconscious parts that have been sleepy or asleep.
With awake-asleep imagery, we can easily suggest our rate of growth is measured by how quickly or slowly we wake up our old sleepy parts and upgrade them to function more aligned with our goals and dreams.
Persona & unconscious = waking & sleeping
The ancient Greeks had a handy idea about the human psyche. They talked about the physical, waking, 3D personality as the “persona,” literally the “mask.” In terms of the psyche--the persona was the small part of our psyche we are conscious of, the “leading edge” of much larger parts of the human psyche--of us--outside our conscious awareness.
A literal mask is a small artificial appliance, part of a costume covering and obscuring the greater whole of the face and body.
If our persona, our persona-ality, is also a mask--what greater whole does it obscure?
The greater whole is always going to be the sub- and unconscious fields, where the majority of our unresolved disturbances lie.
The sub and unconscious are full of thousands of habit patterns and routines, learned in childhood and in other times, all running on automatic—until we address, upgrade and realign those parts.
For simplicity’s sake, we call these “habit patterns.” The idea of a “habit body” is also useful. The booklet, Your Habit Body, An Owner’s Manual may interest you.
Some unconscious sub-routines are beneficial; like, how I brush my teeth and how I chew my food. Some of my unconscious habit patterns are pretty dysfunctional; like, how I get mad at myself when I make a mistake and how I get upset when little things go wrong around me.
Until I “wake them up” and redirect them, these habit sub-routines in my sub- & unconscious are very much “asleep,” dreaming their way thru the same old ways of doing things, over and over and over.
What’s my most wakeful part? My “I am,” the one who lives in the light of day. For me that’s my soul, the part that goes on eternally. You can define your “I am” part any way you like.
The Campfire metaphor
The Campfire metaphor assists us to imagine the boundary between the waking parts of us and our sleeping parts.
We all feel more comfortable being close to our own “I am” force—however we define “I am.” I think of my “I am” as all the parts of me aligned with my eternal soul.
I also think of my soul as the Light of awareness. When I am close to my “I am” I am close to the Light. I can see better in the Light than I can in the darkness. I prefer to be in the Light and spend most of my time in the Lighted area.
Down here in 3D, in the human psyche, organized into three selves, the “I am” shines brightest in the conscious self. The basic self and high self are both dim and dark compared to the conscious self.
We all like to spend our time around the comfortable campfire of the conscious self.” This is our comfort zone.
The comfortable campfire of the conscious self is our lighted area; our sleeping parts are further away from the Light, in the dim and dark areas of our psyche: this creates a polarity easy to grasp and work with.
The poem of the Good Shepherd
The best metaphor I’ve found so far for the activity of redirecting behavior, is the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd goes after each and every lost sheep and redeems it back into the fold, back into the community of sheep, gathered around the warm circle of the Shepherd’s campfire. This is a picture of the mature and loving c/s towards the “negative” habits each of us has calling out for improvement, our old habits calling out for self-improvement.
The good shepherd loves all his sheep.
He hears the bleating of his lost sheep.
It’s only the gray and black ones who are lost,
My bad habits and behaviors.
Does the good shepherd ignore the cries for help?
The good shepherd, the conscious self, goes to assist.
The shepherd leaves the Light and warmth
Of his comfortable campfire in the wilderness.
He goes out into the darkness
To find his sheep.
With all his being
He listens and looks
In every direction in the dark.
Oh, there it is
Hung up on some barbed wire,
Can’t get free by itself.
The good shepherd extricates his charge
With firm, tender care.
He assists, not helps
The lamb to free itself
From where it was caught in the world.
The good shepherd lifts up his sheep
Leads it back into the Light.
The lamb rejoins the flock
Around the Light and warmth of the shepherd’s campfire.
Whenever a lamb is redeemed
The shepherd is happy.
He’s done his job. Peace expands in the Kingdom.
Then he hears the next sheep
Out there, bleating in it’s darkness.
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Growth is upgrading a habit on any level.
Wishing you more magic in your life now.
If you get stuck, give me a call 310-280-1176
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To Learn More:
FULL educational article: "Am I growing? How can I measure it?" $5.00
Partial contents:
HOW does the Good Shepherd redeem his "lost sheep"?
Homework questions
Nothing to fear in our own darkness
Theseus, in the Labyrinth, looking for the Minotaur
How the New is often built
A short history of personal-spiritual growth 1930s-2010
I look forward to assisting you to get where you are going.
If you have any questions or get stuck, give me a call 310-280-1176
Best times to call is between 8:00 am and 9:30 PM PST.
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