The 7 Levels of Awareness: Experience

Level of Awareness: Experience

There is a big difference between learning things and having experience. In gaining experience we’re going to fail. We have to recognize that no matter what, whenever we step outside our comfort zone and we’re moving in a new direction were going to face people, challenges and obstacles we haven’t faced before and opportunities that we don’t know how to take advantage of. And you know what, were going to blow it a lot of the times. But that’s OK, because what we’re going to have to recognize is that we can either fail forward or fail backwards.

And if were willing to fail through this process of gaining experience then our whole world changes. Most of us have been conditioned or programmed to learn from this model of learning which is that we gather information from inside books. Then we take tests on the lessons from the books. And then our teachers give us passing grades that imply we know how to do things. Just because we know how to do things doesn’t mean were going to get the results in our lives. For example, there are all kinds of economists that have PhD’s in economics but they don’t know how to make any money. They understand all about money. Now, I’m a big advocate in studying, learning and gathering information. However, the traditional school systems never taught us how to alter the paradigm that controls our behavior. And that’s why we frequently will not do what it is we already know how to do. We just won’t do it.

Now as we begin to gain experience we begin to get to our next level of awareness which is mastery.

The 7 Levels of Awareness: Discipline

Level of Awareness: Discipline

Let’s say a person has been meeting to go to the gym. When January 1 comes around, they start to go to the gym. However, if they lack the discipline they’ll go right back down to aspiration. They’ll surrender what it is they really want and forget about their goals and give it up. They’ll revert right back to their old way of thinking which will cause them to go back to their old way of doing things.

Now discipline is giving ourselves a command and then following through on the command. It’s saying I’m going to make a commitment to grow spiritually and then we begin to do the activities necessary to fulfill it. It’s saying I’m going to spend more time with my family. Do you know how many business people there are today that are at the level of aspiration? At the middle level of awareness when it comes to their families, they’ve been meaning to spend more time with the wife or husband, they’ve been meaning to spend time with their kids, they’ve been meaning to get together with their siblings. Yet they never get around to doing it. So again, discipline is giving yourself the command ‘I’m going to spend time with my family’ and then you simply make the time.

So we have to be disciplined in this. The Science of Getting Rich program is specifically designed to help you grow in the level of awareness to recondition some of the behavior patterns that have been programmed in our mind, which will challenge the convictions of some of the beliefs we hold on to that limit us from doing this and that make us believe we can’t do this.

Now, the reward we get for discipline is experience, which is our next level of awareness.

The 7 Levels of Awareness: Individual Expression

Level of Awareness: Individual Expression

This is where our desire begins to be expressed through our own uniqueness as a human being. This is really where we become aware that there never has been and there never will be another expression just like you. And when you become aware of your potential then amazing things begin to happen. The moment that you become aware that you can do, be and have more, all of a sudden we begin to gain confidence. We begin to develop faith. Now, faith leads to expectation. And expectation then motivates us to move. That’s really the way this begins to happen. We begin to recognize our own potential.

Now there are people who really believe that there is potential in a job. They believe there’s potential in a business. They believe there’s potential in getting an advanced degree in education. However, there’s absolutely no potential in any of those things. There really isn’t. However, what these things do for us is provide opportunities. The potential is, was and always will be in you. You have infinite potential. And it is our purpose to be a perfect vehicle through which this potential is expressed in a fuller and more meaningful way. Our purpose is to never have lack or limitation in our lives.

We don’t have to go along in our day to look at people that are not living up to their potential. For example, you can go to any fast food restaurant and maybe there’s 15 or 16 people back there and you’ll notice 1 or 2 that seem to be sharper and move faster than the others. They seem to be two steps ahead of everyone else. And you say to yourself ‘that person has so much potential. Don’t they see that they can be doing and having more.’ And the answer is No! That’s why their doing what their doing because they lack the awareness that they can be and have more.

But the moment that we move into this individual expression and we begin to step out of aspiration and we begin to stop saying ‘ I’m gonna get around to doing it’ and actually start doing it, everything in our lives begin to change. And that’s because we made a decision backed by action.

One of the greatest books on personal growth was written by Napolean Hill titled ‘Think and Grow Rich’. And after studying 500 of the richest, most powerful people in the world, Hill broke down the lessons he learned from the Wright Brothers, Alexander Graham Bell, Henry Ford, Charles Schwab, Thomas Edison and many others. He broke down what he learned in 13 principles and one of them is Decision. And he came to the conclusion that people who were successful were very quick decision makers. They made decisions that were in harmony with their purpose, about what it is they wanted in their lives. And they would seldom and if ever change their decisions. In other words, they would immediately begin to act based on those decisions.

And he also said when you study lives of those people who do not reach high levels of success you’ll find that their ambivalent or very slow to make decisions. Their language would be ‘should I or shouldn’t I’ or ‘is this the right thing or is this the wrong thing’. Then they’ll run around and ask other people what they think, because that is very important to us. We’re always concerned with what other people think of us. You know what other people think of us is really none of our business. What’s important is what we think of ourselves. It’s what we’re going to express. And he said when you look at these people their very slow to make decisions and once they make the decisions their quick to change them. And because their quick to change them it creates confusion and chaos. It fails to allow them to act on the idea. That’s the big difference between aspiring to do something and actually doing something. It has nothing to do with the intention. It has everything to do with the decision backed by action.

Now as we step out on this individual expression, in order to continue to move in that direction will require discipline. So, discipline is our next level of awarenes.

The 7 Levels of Awareness: Aspiration

Level of Awareness: Aspiration 

This is really where we become consciously aware of the desire to be, do or have more than our current circumstances. We become more aware that we want more for our lives. We want to get off the treadmill, so to speak. We don’t want to keep doing what everybody else is doing, getting what everybody else is getting. I think most people find themselves at this level, but they get stuck. And they get stuck because the desire is really just a wish without action.

Most people don’t have a proper understanding of what the word desire means. Desire is derived from the Latin word da – sire, which means give birth to. Wallace D. Wattles has the best definition of desire I’ve ever read. And that is:

“Desire is an effort of an unexpressed possibility within us, seeking expression without with and through our actions.”

When you become consciously aware of a desire, what that really means is that it’s an unexpressed possibility. It’s the spiritual side of you seeking expression. Spirit is always for fuller expression and expansion. You and I are spiritual beings gifted with an intellect and were living in physical bodies. And desire is the first sign of conscious awareness of this expression of this power. And it is expressing itself in our conscious awareness to be, do or have more.

And what most people do is they reject the idea for this desire. Now why do they reject the idea? Because they want more, to be more, to do more and to have more. For example, if a person is making $50,000 to $100,000 dollars a year, they absolutely want to earn more. They really do. But what happens is when somebody suggests to them that they can double their income or they can even turn their annual income into a monthly income they reject the idea. But why do they reject the idea? Because that idea is far beyond what their currently getting in their lives. They think they just can’t do it. They have no clear picture.

Remember we think in pictures. They have no clear picture of themselves. And where we don’t have a picture or a vision, we have fear, doubt and confusion. The language of a person who is stuck at this level of awareness is ‘I’ve been meaning to do that.”. Or “I’m going to get around to it”. Or “One of these days.”

For example, have you been meaning to pray more or go to the church? Have you been meaning to do that and just don’t get around to it? Or how many of us been meaning to get to the gym right after new years. We want to be in healthier bodies. We want to look better and we want to feel better and we’re aspiring to do so. Yet we all know that most people who proclaim to do this or who are going to do it, probably will have surrendered the idea by January 31st. And it’s not because they lack the desire. They certainly have the desire, but they have not moved up in their level of awareness to move beyond being stuck.

You know there are people trading stocks and there are certain programs and lessons they can learn that would really allow them to do their trading better. It would allow them to be more strategic. It would allow them to get better results. However, one of these days their going to invest in themselves and take the course. So, when we look at these five areas of our life, one of these areas was personal development. You know most of us don’t have a problem spending 300 to 400 dollars on an Xbox. But when it comes time in investing in ourselves, we get stuck at aspiration. We don’t always take action on what it is that we want to be, do or have in our lives. And we don’t do that simply because of our conditioning and programming. It has nothing to do with the fact that we don’t know how to do it. For example, when we look at our physical bodies, we all know if we exercise more, eat healthier we can improve our health. But we don’t always do what we know. Truly the largest gap in our lives is the gap between that which we know and that which we do.

When a person begins to step beyond those barriers, when they step outside their comfort zone, where growth takes place, then they begin to move up to the next level of awareness. And this is the individual expression.

The 7 Levels of Awareness: Mass

Level of Awareness: Mass

 

People who operate at this level are really just programmed to conform. They have ‘follow the crowd’ type mentality. And there is no thinking at this level. They follow what everybody else is doing.

For example, I can remember watching the business news and I saw thousands of people loose everything they own because they invested all of their money in Enron, a company they worked for. And if you go back and watch some of the news clips, when they interviewed these people and asked them why did they take all of their money and invest it in just one company , most of them would say ‘well that was what everybody else was doing.’ What happened is they were not thinking and they were not planning out. They were just following the crowd.

Another example is when I was a kid I was approached by something who wanted me to smoke a cigarette. At the time I didn’t have much confidence in myself and I wanted to be part of a group. Even though I new smoking was bad for my health, I went ahead and smoked the cigarette. I didn’t wake up one day and decided I was going to smoke. In this situation I didn’t use my reasoning faculty. I guess we can understand it from somebody who’s young and being impressionable and following the crowd. But that’s really how it begins. We just get conditioned and follow that thought and behavior pattern. And in less we break that pattern we can find ourselves in our 40’s, 50’s and 60’s following investment advice based on what everybody else is doing, not necessarily what is best for ourselves in our lives.

 Now when a person begins to move out of the Mass Consciousness, this is where things begin to happen for us. We move to this next level of awareness which is aspiration. My next post will explain this level further.

The 7 Levels of Awareness: Animal

Level of Awareness: Animal

This level of awareness is when a person is completely reacting to what is going on around them instead of responding. A person who is functioning at this level of awareness is controlled really out of fear. They just simply react to things going on around them. And that’s really what animals just do. They react just out of instinct. There is no real thinking going on here. For example, there are some individuals who will simply react to the pressures or stresses or conditions or circumstances in their life. And in most cases they have chosen to react through the uses of drugs or alcohol, and it has led them to loose their family, to loose their friends, to loose their careers, their credibility, their personal integrity and they have no idea how to change. They just lack the awareness. And this is really what happens to somebody who is at this level. People in this type of situation come from all walks of life. It has nothing to do with their intelligence or education level. However, what they all have in common is that they lack the awareness to think in a different way.

Now, when a person begins to move up in their level of awareness they move into what we call Mass Consciousness or a Mass level of awareness. My next post will explain this level further.