Why We Choose to Grow

Awareness Is The First Step

Choose Your Crucible
There are many ways to learn about personal growth issues. Most people don't take those paths consciously. Instead, they allow the world to be their crucible. In doing so, their lives are thrown into turmoil as their lack of self-worth manifests as being fired from their fifth job in a row; or their fear of abandonment gets tested as their spouse leaves them. These are tough issues to deal with in "real life". Sometimes, it's helpful to choose to take your process out of your life and put it into another container where you can look at it and deal with it on less dangerous ground. This is where personal growth comes in.

Choosing To Grow
A few years ago I did an informal survey of the people I knew to be actively involved in (and successful at) personal growth to determine why they chose the path of personal growth in their own lives. Here were their reasons. They wanted to:

• Be happier
• Witness and be party to the awakening of others
• Gain a greater understanding of the world and of themselves
• Expand their options in any situation
• Join in community with other seekers
• Discover pearls of wisdom in themselves and others
• Stop the bad things from happening in their lives - to step out of the victim role
• Participate in the evolution of the human race
• Discover and fulfill their life's purpose
• Expand their capacity to give and receive
• Experience greater freedom
• Explore the depths of themselves and others for the adventure of it
• Find peace and acceptance
• Come closer to God
• Create the life they want
• Get release from fear
• Improve the quality of life
• Know Truth
• Calm the mind

And finally:

"Because growing exceeds, in all ways, any other option."

A couple of them offered me quotes as part of their answers. I include those quotes here for you to consider as well.

"I began to have an idea of my life, not as the slow shaping of achievement
to fit my preconceived purposes, but as the gradual discovery and growth
of a purpose which I did not know." -- Joanna Field

"This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one … the being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy." -- George Bernard Shaw -- from The Fifth Discipline – The Art & Practice of the Learning Organization – by Peter M. Senge

The Benefits of Taking The Work "Offline"
There are many reasons to take your personal growth work out of your daily life and transfer it into a new container. Here are a few:

• Heightened Awareness - We don't often notice when we are in the midst of our own work when it's happening in our day-to-day lives, so we miss the opportunity to do it.
• Support System - The people around us in our daily world are not necessarily the most supportive bunch. Taking the work into a planned environment with facilitators helps us to feel safe to do the work.
• Courage and Stamina - There is always an end to the workshop, ritual, or weekend. When we know that something has a distinct end-point, then we are often able to be stronger and go deeper than we would have allowed ourselves otherwise.
• Building Community - Let's face it, the average person doesn't have a context for any conversation we might want to have on this subject. By joining together with others to walk our paths together, we gain the support of community, comaraderie, and insight that only an outside perspective can offer.

Options for Crucibles
I offer a wide variety of ways to shift your process out of your life and into a format where is it more easily addressed.

• Full-Day and Half-Day Workshops on a variety of topics
• Personal rituals to mark significant transitions in life
• Weekend Journey In Transformation Retreats
• Personal coaching

Welcome to the community. I invite you to join us in person soon.