Hello and welcome to Find Your Way, the podcast. I’m your host Gena McLean, author of the book Find Your Way and writer under the name Seeker and Sage. It’s a joy to be bringing this content to you, and my hope is that it finds its way into your mind and heart, nourishing you and supporting you as you find your way.  

Chapter one. 

Live aware. 

Attentive, alert, awake – sensing the inner and outer landscape, making conscious connections, opening up to knowing and understanding more. 

This is what it means to live aware. 

This is what we must do if we are to live, really live, every day of our life. 

The first entry in this chapter is called awareness is your greatest asset. 

We cannot live a rich and meaningful life if we are not aware – fully present to what is going on inside and around us. 

Nor can we find our way easily if we are wearing blinkers, yet many of us are accustomed to living with this restrictive view. We make choices in the dark, so to speak, trying to find our way without seeing or knowing the whole picture. 

Instead, we need to switch on our awareness – remove the blinkers – and see all there is to see. 

So we can find our way, consciously, mindfully, deliberately, effectively. 

To be aware is to be awake, purposefully looking at and sensing all that is occurring in the inner and outer landscape. Being deliberate with our focus – present and mindful, attentive and observant of what we can and can’t see. 

Change can be confronting and scary, but putting our heads in the sand won’t make the change go away. 

Without awareness, we can’t make authentic choices. 

We can’t even respond, we can only react. And where is the power in that? 

Awareness allows us to make conscious choices – authentic choices – that honor our needs and resonate with who we really are and have the potential to be. 

Even when we react unconsciously, we can always reflect on our action with awareness and by doing so, learn from it so we can choose differently next time. 

Awareness brings choice. It is the doorway to freedom, to change and to you becoming the author of your own life again. 

May I move through this change aware of what’s going on within me and around me. 

There are several things I’d like to look at in that entry. Some of these may have triggered something in you and, and that’s one of the first things I want to mention. 

So when you’re reading this book or listening to me read the book; it’s really important that you start noticing what happens inside you when you hear what I’m saying, when you hear the words from the pages of this book. And this is about you switching on your awareness. 

So sometimes what will happen is you will maybe feel triggered. Or you’ll feel a lurch in your gut or in your heart, and that is really good information. It’s telling you that what you’ve just heard me say, or if you’re reading the book, what you’ve just read means something to you and maybe what that means is those particular words are not happening in your life. Or they bring up a painful memory, a wound. They point out what’s not occurring that you wish was, can point to anything depending on your circumstances. 

So that’s one way you will notice the words and the message is having an effect on you, is I think, really positive because it’s showing you what needs your attention and what needs healing or maybe some deliberate action, even just reflection. 

The other thing that can happen when you’re hearing or reading is you will feel a resonance with the words like they will wash over you or through you like a soft but strong yes. 

And that is really important information too, because it’s telling you that what you’ve just read or those particular words in that message mean something wonderful to you. And hopefully that shows up for you as empowerment, maybe it shows up as resolution, affirmation, it might just strengthen your why, your intention, so it’s all good. It really is all good. All of the information that you are sensing in your body when you hear or read is great information. 

And so that’s what I mean about the inner landscape. 

You can also have those experience with the outer landscape, which is what’s happening on in the world around you through the people you are in relationship with, experiences that are happening at your workplace, even just on the street, out doing the groceries, whatever it may be, so you start noticing what’s happens inside you with these external triggers. 

Because without awareness, as I say on page 21, we can’t make authentic choices, we can’t even respond. All we can do is react and where is the power in that? 

So it’s really wonderful to have your awareness switched on and to start noticing. 

And then you can start reflecting on that information and the whole book will support you to do that, because the whole books message is about moving through our challenges and our changes with more awareness. So that’s more consciously, and to do so in a way that is more compassionate. 

Now that leads me to another entry in chapter one that I’d like to read for you. 

And it’s called see with compassion, on page 38. 

Awareness is not a harsh light we shine on who we’ve been or the choices we’ve made. 

The point is not to observe and reflect so that we can judge and blame. The point is to discover and then to see, consciously and clearly, so we can expand our view and make more authentic and supportive choices. 

To do this, we must bring compassion to our awareness – not just see what there is to see, but see with the desire to ease any suffering that arises, because the discoveries we make about ourselves and our choices aren’t always going to be rosy. 

The negative thoughts and harmful self-talk, the destructive actions and inactions, those unhealthy patterns and habits that are running on repeat will undoubtedly bring up feelings of guilt and shame. 

But mindfully and openly we can carefully unpack and process our experiences without looking to blame ourselves or others. 

We find our way through life with our eyes open and our hearts soft – awake to all that is going on inside us and around us while keeping a loving, gentle acceptance for all that arises, as it arises. 

May I see my situation and choices with compassion and care. 

So you see the awareness it is not a harsh light that we shine on ourselves or the choices we’ve made, or the people we’re in connection with, or having trouble with. The point is purely to observe and then we have information that we can reflect on, and then we can process it as I say we can openly and mindfully process and unpack our experiences without any blame. 

So my challenge for you is to start seeing, turn your awareness on, and remember to bring compassion to that awareness, especially when something comes up that feels quite painful emotionally, or there’s a trigger that sparks, you know, quite a bit of discomfort inside. 

Let’s all do our best to bring compassion to that for ourselves as we find our way. 

Thank you for being here. 

Thank you. 

It’s an honor to have you with me.