Your daily ticket to Narnia

“I hate when I look in my closet and find clothes instead of Narnia.” 
― H.B. Bolton

(Picture courtesy of http://www.oldvic.ac.uk/the-lion-the-witch-and-the-wardrobe.html)

Last night I saw the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School’s Christmas Show “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” and spend a magical time with Lucy, Susan, Peter and Edmund in Narnia; a great start for getting into the Christmas spirit.

Sadly Christmas can be a very stressful time. Venturing into any town centre at this time of year, rather than being immersed in feelings of magic, wonder and anticipation you probably will experience sensations of stress, rushing and impatience all around you. Having been caught last Saturday in the crush of Bath Rugby supporters, Christmas market visitors and Christmas Shoppers I really did not see much evidence of people smiling and feeling happy or any other expression of the Christmas Spirit.

Anxiety, worry and stress not only rob us of the experience of happiness, can make us ill and our life miserable, it also is known to block the flow of our creativity. Wouldn’t it be great if we could have an easy simple technique to access the inner space of creativity, if we could find our very own wardrobe entry to this magical land?

Recently I have come across the work of Tom Stone, the creator of Human Software Engineering, a system to help debug and reprogram the human mind for more happiness and greater productivity. Without going into too much detail about the programs he designed, I found that by just experimenting with one of the exercises he created you can quickly and easily experience a great sense of inner peace. This can be can be your ticket to your very own Narnia. So Daughter of Eve, Son of Adam, get ready to enter “the far land of Spare Oom where eternal summer reigns around the bright city of War Drobe” (in the words of the adorable Mr Tumnus in the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe).

Let me introduce you to Tom Stone’s GAP exercise. GAP stands for “Greater Awareness Place”. Tom Stone uses the metaphor of a partially cloudy day when you can see the clouds travelling across the background of a blue sky. In this metaphor the clouds stand for our thoughts and the blue sky represents the constant background of our pure awareness. He says that pure awareness is our essential nature but through our early conditioning we habitually identify with our thoughts and our stories and forget that behind those thoughts and stories we always are and always will be pure awareness. What you will experience when you do this exercise, is a place of calm and peace, a space that can be described as unbounded, limitless, spacious and expansive. Out of this space feelings of peace, love and joy spontaneously arise. This space also gives birth to our creativity.

To do the GAP exercise just follow these simple instructions:

1)   Commit to 10 – 15 minutes to do this exercise. Sit quietly and close your eyes.

2)   Then just notice what happens. Thoughts come and go. You may notice the feeling of your body sitting in the chair. You may notice other noises or sensations. Do nothing. Simply be the witness and observe what’s happening.

3)   Allow yourself to notice a gap between your thoughts. You can asked the question “Where is my next thought coming from?”  Notice what happens.

4)    Immerse yourself in the gap between the thoughts. Notice that there is a space of emptiness. This is the experience of pure awareness. A quiet still place filled with limitless potential. Notice how you feel in this place.

5)   When you are ready slowly open your eyes and re-orientate yourself back into the room.

6)   Realize that even though you are back in the room, pure awareness is still there in the background, like the blue sky behind the clouds.

 

7)   Notice that when you were aware of pure awareness there were no sensations of stress or anxiety or any other of the negative feelings we experience on a regular basis.

Simply committing to do this exercise once or twice a day every day will bring more of the qualities of pure awareness into your daily life. You will feel calmer, happier, more productive and new ideas will come to you easily.

You can read more about Tom Stone’s Pure Awareness Breakthrough Techniques for free here.

I hope that this Christmas you will give yourself the gift of experiencing pure awareness and that in 2014 instead of clothes you will find Narnia in your closet.

And remember:

“Once a king or queen of Narnia, always a king or queen of Narnia.” 
― C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe