The Language of Your Soul

The Push/Pull Awareness Exercise

Your inner being, your soul, your true self is constantly communicating to you. However, that doesn’t mean that we are always listening or paying attention. The first step in the Receive Your Life process is to hear and record the dialogue with your true self.

But what exactly are you listening for? You’re listening for a feeling and ultimately, as you’ll see as we go along, you’re listening for thoughts. We’ll start with what you are feeling. You’re discerning between the feeling of alignment and the feeling of resistance. There is tremendous value in what you are feeling. These feelings, both positive and negative, reflect your inner wisdom. Your feelings are either a confirmation that you are aligned with your true self or they are alerting you that you are drifting away from your true self.

The language of your soul, which are your thoughts and feelings, are revealed in your Push/Pulls. When you are aligned with your true self you feel good, you feel pulled. There is an energy calling you forth and you may feel energized, inspired, excited, engaged, powerful, strong and/or confident, etc. Even if what you are feeling is sad when you are aligned with your inner being there is a peace, a gentleness, a purity to your sorrow. It isn’t the feeling of suffering. You are not fighting against or resisting what is.

When you are out of alignment with your true self, when you are compromising yourself, you feel it as resistance. It is a push. You may feel constriction, anxiety, tension, anger, lethargic and/or powerless at the effect of life.

When we first start noticing our Push/Pulls it is easy to begin judging them. “It shouldn’t be a push for me to drive my son to baseball practice,” or “it shouldn’t be a push for me to talk with my husband.” “What does this mean? Am I bad person. Why can’t I be more tolerant, have more patience?” Or, “maybe this push means I should quit my job.” Or this pull means, “I should quit my job and be a designer.” Or, “I should borrow the money to take the trip.”

Right now, you are just a scribe gathering your personal data for further study. As we go along you will understand exactly what your soul is communicating to you and be able to make conscious decisions that align with your true nature.

PUSH/PULL EXERCISE

I suggest you have a separate journal or notebook to gather your Push/Pulls. You’ll be gathering and using them throughout the course and will want them easily accessible.

To do this exercise, take out your journal or notebook. On the top of one page write Pushing Against and at the top of another page write Being Pulled. You can record your pushes and pulls at the end of the day, in the moment you become aware of them, or whenever you have time to reflect on your day. For the first session, see if you can write down a handful of your Push/Pulls. You can’t get this exercise wrong. There is no right way to do it. You’re just becoming more aware of what you’re feeling and writing it down. I can help you with any questions you may have when we meet for our class.

However, after saying that, there are two things to keep in mind that will be helpful for you while you are recording your Push/Pulls:

There are two guidelines to help you more effectively record your Push/Pulls:

(1) The first is to do this exercise without judgment. You are the scribe recording the flow of your energy. There is nothing you have to do with the information you record in this step. You are just recording what you are feeling. In the next several steps you will work with the data you are gathering.

(2) The second thing to keep in mind is that you want to be as specific as possible when you record your Push/Pulls, as if you are experiencing these in the moment. The more specific you are, the clearer the information you will receive from your Push/Pulls. Instead of listing my work is a push, describe the situation that is causing the push. My co-worker dumped a file on my desk and walked away or I was at a meeting and my boss interrupted me. Or for a pull instead of saying, I love my work. Describe the situation at your work that is causing the positive feeling. My colleague had an enthusiastic response after reading the article I wrote or my client mentioned she told her friend about me and her friend wanted my contact information.

Very often it can feel as if something is both a push and a pull. It is not possible for something to be both a push and a pull in a particular moment. If you slow it down, you can see when a pull drifted into a push and vice versa. Years ago when I had my own tax practice talking with clients was a strong pull. I loved hearing what they were up to and discussing their finances with them. However, once they left and it dawned on me that I had to do the tax return, I would feel a strong push.

When you feel yourself resisting something, or when you have the feeling of Pushing Against, make a note of it. Write this down in your journal. You will know this Pushing Against feeling because this feeling is much like what you would feel if you were trying to go against a current, against a flow.

With a push you may experience the sense of a pit in your stomach or a tightness in your chest. When you get this feeling, write down what you were doing or thinking about when this feeling came over you. Perhaps someone said something to you, or maybe you were working on a project you disliked, or maybe you felt awkward in a particular social situation.

The opposite of pushing against is being pulled toward. When you feel your energy calling you forth, when you find yourself gravitating to something, make a note of this on the page of your journal with the heading, Being Pulled. The activity you make a note about can be almost anything: a conversation you were engaged in, a request someone made of you, a comment someone made, a call from a client, an interaction with your child, a commercial you saw on television, something you read on the Internet, seeing a certain food item when grocery shopping, etc. Nothing is too trivial.

Some examples of Push/Pulls…

PUSHING AGAINST

(feeling resistance)

1. My boss ignoring a co-worker’s request that I be involved in a project.
2. Opening my credit card statement.
3. Shopping for a new outfit
4. Having my supervisor pile more work on my desk.
5. Feeling bored at my job.
6. Not getting invited to the party.
7. Checking my emails and seeing that my client still hasn’t paid me.
8. Listening to my cousin talk about her vacation.
9. Having an argument with my sister.

BEING PULLED TOWARD

(feeling inspired)

1. Being assigned new projects by my supervisor.
2. When one of the students in my physics class wanted extra help.
3. Going on my walk this morning.
4. Collaborating on a new business project.
5. Meeting with my friend for coffee.
6. Setting up the room for my class.
7. Reading the article my brother sent me.
8. Hearing the meeting got cancelled.
9. Working on my writing project.

Your list may look very different from this list. Remember your Push/Pulls will be unique to you. What may be a pull for one person may be a push for another and vice versa. The important thing to remember is write down your Push/Pulls without judgment. There is nothing you have to do with your data at this point. Just collect your data and together we will explore the guidance and wisdom in your information