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The Nine Day Class
An Exercise in Attainment
Lesson 4 - Your ability to accomplish
Sadly, there are many people who believe that they are failures. They feel as though they are incapable of doing any thing right. Such unhappy souls convince themselves that they are only able to make mistakes.
Rare is the person who has not suffered some set-back or failure or loss. Such things happen. People may make mistakes. People might sometimes get it wrong. There are even occasions when a major endeavor comes to naught. These things happen, but they should not define us. It is truly said that the only real failure is to give up.
Take the sport of stick ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Either way, folks who lose a stickball game one day will be back playing the next day. What matters is that they do not give up playing game just because of a loss.
Often we see a success rise on the ashes of one botched adventure. Often do we see the lesson learned from one mistake become a stepping stone toward future success. The reason is simple: we are successes. You prove your ability to succeed by reading this page. You successfully learned the arcane skill of communicating via a set of complex symbols: reading. Look at the other things you get right. You are able to dress yourself, tie your shoes, and do everything from maintain your home to shop for food. In the course of this you use a complex array of products and techniques.
As a Pagan, it is likely you have learned many skills. It may be reading Runes, Tarot, or making incense. There are common skills, such as playing cards, playing complex board games, or making things as part of a hobby. The point is that these are all things you manage to accomplish. They require an assortment of basic skills, from reading to arithmetic to various techniques. Your everyday life shows you to be a person who can accomplish many things successfully.
No matter what set-backs you may have had in the past, they are small when compared with the things you have accomplished. You are able to get things done. You are capable of accomplishing things successfully. Your ability to read these words is proof that you have it within you to succeed.
Meditation: Ponder the things you have learned, and the things you can do,. It does not matter how well you do them. Just being able to do them is enough. Consider all the times you were right, the times you managed to do a task successfully. Even simple things add up. Shopping trips, cooking meals, even tying your shoes shows an ongoing pattern of success. Accept that whatever disappointments you had, you still have many, many successes. Though small, your achievements add up. Know yourself as a successful, capable person. Enjoy the feeling of being a person who does good things.
Thought for the Day: I am a success. Set-backs do not define me. No matter what set-backs I may have had in the past, I remain a success. My successful nature defines me now!
Exercise: Get a piece of paper. On one half write a list of things you accomplished because you wanted them. Do not worry about listing things because your parents or school or your job wanted you to do them. List things you wanted to do, and did. They can include skills you learned, things you made, competitions or awards you won, trips you took, etc. They can be big or small, or both. You should be able to list ten things.
Now for the hard part. On the other half, list the disappointments you handled. By handled, we do not necessarily mean you turned them around. You handled them if you were able to deal with the loss, whether it stayed lost or not. List things that you really wanted, that you lost, or that failed, or that disappointed you. The fact that you can write them down is evidence that you handled them.
Now, put the paper in a safe place. Forget about it until tomorrow. This exercise will be completed with tomorrows lesson