Belief Is A Powerful Thing

"We have all a better guide in ourselves,

if we would attend to it,

than any other person can be."

-- Jane Austen

Believing in ourselves, and in our own wisdom to guide our own lives, even ignoring or discounting what others tell us makes all the difference in how we flow through life and in our work.

I love how Jane says it so well. Swami Vivekananda takes it a step or two further in saying, "If faith in ourselves had been more extensively taught and practiced, I am sure a very large portion of the evils and miseries that we have would have vanished." Another author, e. e. cummings fills in some color by saying, "Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit."

I've seen firsthand what that calm, confidence looks and acts like, and it is rather like even forgetting oneself because the confidence level is such that there is no need to focus there; almost as if it is a given. Joseph Campbell captured that thought this way: "When we quit thinking primarily about ourselves and our own self-preservation, we undergo a truly heroic transformation of consciousness."

And, one more empowering thought for you this day from Thomas A. Edison:

"If we did all the things we are capable of, we would literally astound ourselves."