Principles of Individual Transformation

Are you completely satisfied with who, what, or where you are now? Most of us aspire to be or have something different than we enjoy at present. "Becoming" is a part of this life, and that's what transformation is all about--becoming more than you are, or appear to be, at present. Here are ten principles that may guide you in your quest.

1. Whatever you are experiencing at this very moment is appropriate to your need to grow. If what's happening to you currently is unpleasant, this can be a tough one to swallow. This is called the "rule of appropriateness" and it is based on a simple premise: the purpose of your life (yours, mine, everyone's) is growth (No, happiness is a by-product) The implications of this principle are immense: if you aren't happy where you are, you will be required to learn the lesson involved before you will be able to move on.

2. It doesn't matter what happened or who did it to you. The only thing that matters is what you do about it. I learned this from W. Mitchell, a friend and colleague who suffered paralysis and burns over 80% of his body as a result of successive motorcycle and aircraft accidents. Mitchell is living proof of this statement. He has shown me and countless others, that it really doesn't make a difference what happened to you; the only thing that makes a difference is WHAT YOU DO ABOUT IT! Think about the actions you can (must) take to change your situation. That's the beginning of transformation.

3. You are NOT alone. This may be a difficult to concept to hold on to when you're up to your armpits in alligators, but it's true. You are an essential part of a huge interconnected mass of information and energy, and that energy is spiritual, not material. The "new" physics (actually, it's ancient wisdom) has gone to great lengths to explain that all matter is really 98% empty space, and that what we regard as solid body is really invisible non-material sub-atomic particles. But it goes further. You are a spiritual being (admit it or not) and your identify transcends your body, this earth, and the experience of death.

4. Connectedness is a fact, not an achievement. You can't even change it, you can only refuse to admit it! Your identity and being are sustained regardless of what you do or what happens to you.

5. There is a purpose, and you are part of it. You are idea, the creation of a Principle that operates according to an invariable purpose, of which you are an integral part. This fact is all too often obscured by the random events that occur in "this" life. Which brings us to the next point...

6. We live simultaneously in two realities. Most of the time, we're held by our perceptions and our current state of awareness, in the "world reality"--a material, sensory, and sometimes random complex of events, persons, things and concepts. This reality seems real because we see it, hear it, smell it, touch it, and taste it, but like the apparent solidity of the human body, it ISN'T real. It's a construction of reality. Beyond this world reality, there is a universal reality and self that are spiritual, perfect, and eternal--untouched by the transient events of the world reality.

7. Lack is an unnatural state. Lack is a part of the world reality that is based on an entropic universe in which everything gradually runs down and dies out. Poverty is the tragic result of our acceptance of lack as an acceptable state. In contrast, the true state of universal reality is abundance--infinite creation from an infinite reservoir of information and energy. To overcome lack, you must reject it peremptorily as being either acceptable or real. This is both an act of faith and an essential element in the process of transformation.

8. Transformation begins with faith rather than fact. If you're blind, you cannot experience color. You have to take it on faith. Similarly, spiritual reality is not provable through perception, facts, or logic. In Zen, what's required is termed, "a great leap of faith", in Christian terminology, it's "having faith as a grain of mustard seed". Faith is the beginning and the end. In biblical terms, it is "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

9. Transformation precedes transcendence. Transformation involves a gradual change from one state to another. Transcendence involves letting go of everything that limits you. Transformation is improvement; transcendence is renewal. To be transformed is to embrace both realities effortlessly. To transcend is to relinquish the world (material) reality in favor of the universal (spiritual) reality. Complete transcendence seldom occurs on this side of the death experience.

10. Letting go. We are bound to this world by our attachments. Little by little, we are forced by circumstance and destiny to let go of worldly things and ultimately, of this life itself. The trick is to recognize that letting go doesn't need to be a sacrifice. True letting go is a peaceful event.