“Genius is a crisis that joins the buried self, for certain moments, to our daily mind.” ­William Butler Yeats 

The 13^th Century mystic Saint Francis of Assisi claimed we are that which we are seeking. For the last two weeks, at two back-to-back Advanced Workshop in Cancun, Mexico, I witnessed more than a thousand of our genius students do exactly that—they became their future.

Do you ever wonder why I always call our students geniuses? Because in the original sense of the word, genius means attendant spirit—being in the care of something unseen but near. In this case, that unseen but near something was their future. Day after day in their meditations our passionate and committed students became true geniuses by going after their future with the level of intensity that’s required for us to move from the limiting thoughts, beliefs, and emotions of our past, to the unlimited possibilities of our future.

Going into the workshop, my personal goal was to take our students deeper than they’ve ever gone. We accomplished this feat through standing, walking, laying, and sitting meditations, and we did it with both our eyes opened and closed. At the end of the event, I wanted our students to believe in their future more than they believed in their past.

What we ultimately achieved was we took a community of people who were thinking, acting, and feeling one way when they arrived to the event, and they left thinking, acting, and feeling another. We helped them create a new future from a place of wholeness and oneness—as opposed to the common way to create from a place of separation, duality, and lack. Why this is important is because the quantum model of reality says we are not separate from that which we seek; rather, we are connected to it through the unified field. We only need to feel and observe it to bring that future to us.

The beauty and the agony of the return

For those of you who attended, as well as anyone who might need a refresher, I wanted to take this opportunity to remind you of a few things to keep you on your creative track. So let’s start by demystifying the unknown.

The main reason why we retreat from our lives for several days to meditate is to remove the constant stimulation in our external environment. We do this for three reasons:

1. Because our brain operates as a record of the past;
2. When we live by the same feelings every day we are living in our past, which means more of our attention is in our past than in our future;
3. External stimulation reminds us of who we think we are as a personality.

But when we separate long enough from the people we know, places we go, and the repetitive actions we do every day, we are reminded of the truth about who we are—infinite creators.

So now let’s say you just had an amazing workshop, connected with like-minded people, perhaps experienced synchronicities or mystical experiences—but then you have to return to your life. Then what?

For some of you, you may return to your life feeling great, but quickly be confronted with your past. For others, unforeseen struggles may appear out of nowhere, causing you to question everything you thought you just created. And still for others, the things you’ve been working on creating may begin to actually show up.

Make no mistake; things are going to shake up in unforeseen ways. Why? Because you just spent several days investing an exorbitant amount of energy into the unknown and creating new things in your life. It’s only logical then that for something new to appear, the known and familiar has to fall by the wayside. If this didn’t occur, you’d be living in the same predictable past, which creates the same predictable future.

Don’t let the shakeup shake you down

When things begin to shake up in your life, a certain percentage of you will trust what’s happening and say to yourself—if this opportunity is showing up, or if this relationship no longer fits who I am, or my job doesn’t align with who I want to be—then these things must be showing up for a reason. I created it, so let’s see what happens. But for others, you may begin to second guess yourself and recoil in fear. The biggest reason why this happens and why people revert to their past is because they don’t really trust themselves, the creative process, or the experiences they’re having.

Now no one said trust is easy, but don’t you think that by placing your trust in the unknown you’re likely to experience some discomfort? That discomfort is actually a good thing. You have disrupted the energy of your pre-existing life (before the event) by taking your attention off the people and things that emotionally bound you to the past. Now your external life is reorganizing to come into alignment with your internal creation—now you’re living in the quantum model of possibility, as opposed to the Newtonian model of measurement and predictability.

Once you start choosing (unconsciously, by the way) doubt and fear, or start analyzing and figuring out how things are going to unfold, then you’re back in the familiar, your possibility contracts, and what you created begins to disappear. Thus, because of the discomfort and fear you experienced, you take your attention off the future, return it to the past, and now you’re back in the unconscious programs that previously ran your life.

You can do two things in this instance; revert to the past, or you can look at it as an opportunity to turn discomfort into knowing.

How to win the faceoff with your past

Everybody is going to face their past when they return from a workshop because they’re returning to their past/present reality. This is why we meditate—to remain connected to the frequency and vibration of our future self. Each time we disconnect from our environment, we move more deeply towards the unified field, or Source. The more we connect with this self-organizing field, the more we feel whole, the more our hearts open up, the more we trust, and the more our belief in our future becomes a knowing.

But if you’re not connecting with Source every day, and you’re not connecting with your future, you begin to doubt yourself and return back to separation, polarity, duality, and lack. Then you find yourself unconsciously anticipating your future based on your past. This is going to happen from time to time. It doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong—it’s just life. But the choice is yours as to whether or not you go unconscious and fall back into your old programs of judging and analyzing yourself, trying to intellectualize a process, and/or trying to control and predict an outcome.

But you can also make a difference choice—you can choose to change your emotional reactions and habits and get beyond your mind and body. Instead of letting the program run itself, you can choose to think the thoughts you do want to fire and wire—the thoughts, actions, and feelings connected to your future. This is where you need to remember to be kind to yourself and understand that true, lasting change is a gradual process.

So as you walk back into your life, stay present to this moment and be confident in the creations that show up. If an opportunity appears or life is pushing you in a direction that you created—you created it, so why not step into it? This is the journey, and this is being an active participant in the mystery, rather than separate from it and standing on the sidelines.

If you start feeling fear, uncertainty, lack, or any other negative emotions, give yourself an adult timeout, meaning—sit down in meditation and tell yourself you’re not getting up until you feel empowered, trusting, or loving. This is how we cross the river of change. Remember that if you’re feeling uncomfortable, it’s a good thing. It’s just thoughts or emotions within your programmed old self, and just because you have a thought doesn’t mean it’s real. Don’t analyze it—just change your state of being. Then do it again.

My definition of genius has always been to be uncomfortable in the unknown, and to be okay with it. So if you find yourself getting used to the unknown, it might just become the new normal for you. As you keep stepping towards your destiny, you will continue to run into the unknown, but eventually the unknown will become the known and your life will become predictable. When this happens and your soul begins to stir, you’ll want to create the next opportunity in your life, so you’ll employ the same process, and once again you’ll find yourself in a new unknown.

And who knows, this might even become a habit.