Module 6: Forgiveness, Reframing & Compassion

In this module, you will do some dedicated forgiveness work, now that you are primed with a level of self-understanding and compassion. You will learn how to reframe any of your funky ideas that hold you back and speak to yourself in a way that elevates your goodness and agency.

A pattern within this course is the building of self-esteem through creating a sense of personal power. One way we give up our power is by giving in to certain thoughts and not choosing other thoughts or beliefs in their place. Even if you have what may seem to be a positive belief, you still can choose again or be aware that there are multiple options for how to think about a situation. For example, if you have the (vey Aussie-sounding) thought ‘She’ll be right, mate’, you could still turn that hopeful and positive belief into the thought ‘We have the power to turn this situation around’. See how that cultivates personal power, not just universal surrender?

And then there are obvious times where your beliefs do you a great disservice. If you have compulsory workplace training and your prevailing thought is ‘this is a waste of time’, then your experience of that training is going to be awful. Or if you think that everybody is out to get you or that you are just not good at x,y,z it can create a feeling of doom and gloom that could affect your health. Or it could stop meeting new people and trying activities that could be challenging and rewarding.

So our beliefs really dictate our experiences and our overall happiness, which is why the work in this module is so important.

Challenge One

Your first challenge is to track any negative thoughts or beliefs that come up this week and immediately write a counterpoint or different perspective. I wish every person could generate new, interesting and useful perspectives like lightning. It is one of the most valuable skills we can develop as individuals and as a society. It is how problems can be solved and how humans can start achieving their potential. Before you transform that belief, you can do the ‘forgiveness chant’, where reflecting on the original thought you say ‘I forgive you, I’m sorry, I love you’, which really releases and begins to transmute the energy around that limiting belief.

Here are some examples of transforming thoughts and beliefs into ones that are better for you and more useful overall. Imagine you wake up groggily at 11am and think, ‘Damn, I am just not a morning person’ and do that every weekend for years. You’ll begin to reinforce what you are, what you are not, and associate it with a particular feeling, in this case groggy. So whenever you think about waking up, it is associated with a personal limitation you are reinforcing while feeling not physically at your peak. More useful thoughts would be:

It’s nice being able to sleep in.

I love having slow mornings.

Another beautiful day!

You can even turn the original statement into a more useful question that will generate an answer, like:

How can I feel refreshed this morning?

What am I looking forward to today?

When am I at my peak?

To complete the challenge, make sure you highlight or rewrite your favourite beliefs —sentiments to live by that lift your mood and make you feel powerful.

You can watch the Language Shapes Ideas video and practise using some of the sentence starters to reframe your self-perceived weaknesses or limitations. This will complement the work we did finding the light side of the dark.

Challenge Two

The energy of forgiveness is letting go with love, and so this next challenge is really going to open you up to that energy. Give away or sell things that you are willing to part with, but have been holding onto out of fear. There are many reasons to do this, including to begin attracting money, but for this course, you will do it so that letting go becomes natural, however hard it is at first. We can let go of beliefs and resentment with that same initial tension and then loving release.

Challenge SUMMARY

♦ Track any negative thoughts or beliefs that come up this week and immediately write a counterpoint or different perspective. Use forgiveness chants on the initial limiting beliefs (I forgive, I’m sorry, I love you).

♦ Watch the Language Shapes Ideas video and practice using some of the sentence starters to reframe your self-perceived weaknesses or limitations.

♦ Practice letting go with love. Do this by willingly giving away or selling things you’ve been holding onto out of fear.

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