1. Practice personal development

Taking action to better your life through the concept of personal development is an extremely effective way to make yourself a more conscious human being. Virtually every aspect of personal development deals with upgrading your state of awareness whether it be directly or a side-effect from something like overcoming fear. Think of personal development as the act of upgrading every area of your life to function at the highest possible level: health, finances, relationships, etc.

There are tons of awesome ways to practice personal development. Actions that I take to educate myself in the field of personal development include: reading personal development books, reading personal development blogs, listening to personal development audio programs, talking with others interested in personal development, and using internal reflection (meditation) to consciously learn from and understand my life. I like to think of personal development as a learning process involving the act of applying wisdom from myself and others to be a better functioning human being.

For the long-term, personal development has potential to make you a healthy, wealthy, and wise person. With that said, the advice that you gain from pursuing your personal development is only as effective as the degree to which you are able to apply the advice to your life. I believe that an easy way to apply what you’ve learned from personal development to your life is to take immediate action after learning an important piece of material. Take immediate action in the act of applying your new knowledge to your life. Without taking any form of action after learning a new personal development technique, the advice can be deemed absolutely useless to your life.

If you find yourself interested in the concept of using personal development for conscious advancement, there are many wonderful online sources to help you with your journey. There are also many great books to help you move forward with your conscious advancement with a primary focus on personal development. I think that if you are interested in the concept of conscious development, pursuing personal development can prove to be highly rewarding.

In contrast, conscious advancement and personal development are very similar concepts that yield similar results. Comparatively, conscious advancement is just one aspect of personal development, while virtually all aspects of personal development lead to greater conscious development.

2. Shift your conscious focus; focus on the now

Being preoccupied with thoughts of past events and of the future has potential to lead your consciousness in the wrong direction. Focusing your attention on this exact moment (commonly referred to as “the now”), however, is a great way to raise your level of awareness. It is a great habit to get yourself into focusing on the now because the practice has been associated with many positive life changes. Focusing your attention on this exact moment in time is a great way to get rid of negative emotions, enjoy the moment, and really in full control of your consciousness.

A great way to practice focusing your attention on the now is to guide your consciousness. Every time that you catch your mind wandering towards past memories or future hopes, shift your attention back to this exact moment. Ask yourself what you can do in this exact moment to ensure optimal conscious development. As you work on your conscious development, focusing on the now will become much easier. Individuals at higher levels of conscious functioning, understand the concept that there really is no past or future, there’s only right now.

Imagine what depressed individuals could do if they could just shift their focus to the moment of the now and decide that from this point on, they are going to be happy. It would work, because there is no reason to feel depressed unless by choice if you are able to avoid thoughts about the past or future. The truth is, most people feel a certain way due to momentum from their past. Momentum from the past and preoccupation with past thoughts has a very big impact on the way in which we are feeling right now. This is why it may be very difficult for some to shift their focus away from depression and consciously choose to be happy instead. When our focus cannot be shifted from a lower state like depression, consciousness automatically is guided to an even lower state of functioning.

Therefore, a great exercise to practice if you’re ever feeling depressed is to shift your focus to the now (this exact moment), and decide to be grateful for everything positive in your life. If you are more consciously advanced, you will instantly be able to shift from depression to a state of gratitude and happiness.

Heres another realistic scenario: Let’s say that you are in an argument with another individual and are in a state of pure fury due to the remarks made by the other individual. If you would simply shift your focus to this exact moment, you could program yourself with the idea that in the grand scheme of life, this dispute is a minor rough patch that can be peacefully resolved. You then could consciously take full control and decide to positively change yourself to put yourself in position to make peace of the argument. All fury and anger will instantly vanish as soon as you shift your entire focus to something else.

Focusing on the now is an extremely powerful concept that has potential to instantly change the entire focus of your life. Focusing on the now is one of my favorite exercises to practice throughout the day. It will do a great job at teaching you to be consciously aware of your thoughts and shifting them from a state of past and future into the moment. Meditation also boosts my ability to focus on the now. By learning techniques that allow you to shift your awareness to this exact moment, you can work wonders in the process of conscious advancement.

3. Be energetic; allow others to feel your radiance

Being energetic can be very powerful for advancing your state of consciousness and for inspiring others to become more consciously advanced. Your body can become energized and your brain can become energized. When both are operating in at maximum intensity and energy, you are said to be in a state of peak performance.

Energy serves the purpose of giving you conscious power to help your own awareness and that of others. Acting lively, speaking passionately, and using your energy to achieve maximum positive expression will attract positive, conscious attention. On the other hand, acting tired all the time, speaking sluggishly, without enthusiasm or excitement, or expressing your energy an unhealthy way will attract negative attention. Healthy ways to express your energy include: smiling, laughing, starting an interesting conversation, giving a compliment, exercising, getting proper sleep, and using relaxation techniques. Unhealthy ways to express your energy include: thinking negatively, stressing yourself out, arguing with others, fighting with others, and any action that can be considered self-harm. What’s ironic is that all of the unhealthy ways to express your energy are much more draining of energy than all of the healthy ways to express your energy.

Allowing others to get a positive vibe from your energy will first require that you make a conscious effort to express your energy in a positive manner. Every single action that you take draws from a specific type of energy within. As you increase the number of times that you positively express your energy each day, you will be naturally reciprocated and replenished with excess energy to positively express your the future. Coincidentally, increasing the amount of unhealthy ways in which you express your energy will drain your overall energy for your future. Become more conscious by directing and expressing your energy in as most positive manner as possible.

4. Make healthy dietary changes; be conscious of what you consume

Making healthy dietary changes means searching to find the best possible diet to fit your mental needs, physical needs, spiritual needs; to fit your needs. Are you fully conscious of what you are consuming? Are you a meat eater? Did you ever consider consciously thinking about the pain of the animal that suffered and died before you ate that big piece of ribeye steak? Or are you a person who lacks total compassion for animals and disregards them as a beautiful expression of life here on Earth? Or are you a vegetarian that has never opened up your belief system and tried thinking that eating meat may actually be good for you – providing your body with vital nutrients that the vegetarian diet misses?

I am currently a vegetarian for personal, moral, and ethical reasons: I am consciously aware of the pain, suffering, and killing cycle of animals for food sacrifice and I feel that it should be stopped. I also have yet to witness any evidence in my physical body or mental ability that would lead me to believe that vegetarianism is unhealthy. I have read cases where certain individuals didn’t react well to switching to a vegetarian diet, while others actually felt much better after the change. It all depends on the person; we are all unique. As already mentioned in the previous article, trying new things and consciously experimenting in life will raise your awareness.

Maybe you need to cut sugar and sweets from your diet for optimum health, maybe you should try a vegan diet, maybe a raw foods diet will work best. No matter your diet of choice, it is important to be non-judgmental towards the diets of others. Arguments can be made in support and in opposition of eating meat; they can also be made for and against eating a vegetarian diet, raw food diet, and virtually every other type of diet. Debates can be made for and against any diet.

What matters most for conscious advancement is to find a diet that works best for your needs, while being completely conscious of what you consume. Simple questions such as: how will eating this affect my thinking, body, health, etc. are all questions you should be asking. You should also ask other questions such as: How does eating this affect the planet? AND Did an animal suffer and die for my personal benefit? Be aware of where your food came from, if it has been chemically treated or altered, injected with additives or preservatives, and if it is healthy for your body.

To advance consciously it is important to be respectful and accepting of the diets of other individuals without making spiteful judgments. But most importantly, in order to boost your own level of consciousness, it is important to be fully aware of the food in which you are consuming in your diet.

5. Accept others for who they are

As mentioned above in being conscious of what you eat, it is important to be accepting of the diets that others choose to use. Whether they make a conscious decision to have an unhealthy diet or unconscious decision, accept their actions. Accepting others can apply to every area of life. No matter if you disagree with another person’s actions, disagree with their personality, or disagree with their perception of life, it is important to accept them for who they are and not try to force changes upon them. Settle your disagreements with other individuals by purely accepting them for who they are.

Realize that we are all unique individuals with different needs, different life stories, and different interpretations of life. The easiest way to overcome all disagreements is to accept others for their differences and be grateful for the unique perspective that each person brings to the table. If everyone were the same in life, life just wouldn’t be as much fun! Pure acceptance for others may not be easy initially, especially if you are a person that likes to fix bad habits in others.

Chances are good that if another person is involved in a bad habit, he or she may want to break that habit. What you can do is work with them to make conscious positive change to replace bad habits with good ones if they want to break the habit. However, if the individual doesn’t feel any urge to change his or her bad habits, don’t try to be in control of their life; you’ve already got your own to deal with. Let others live their own life without being judgmental. Don’t attempt to take control over others; it gets your ego heavily involved. Instead realize and accept the fact that everyone will have their time to consciously evolve and deal with perceived personal shortcomings.

6. Accept and love yourself for who are; count your blessings

Life’s journey becomes much easier and significantly enriched if you can learn to accept yourself for who you are. Depending on your current state of consciousness, it may be difficult to love and accept who you are. Often times people operating in lower levels search for ways to externally look better, places to buy fancier clothing, ways to make more money, and the best place to get breast implants. Q: Why do they do it? A: Because they truly believe that it will make them happier.

The real truth is, none of these things will make a person happier in the long-term. What will make you happy is being deeply grateful for what you already have. Though you may not have a lot of money, top-notch clothing, a perfect face, or have Hooter’s girl sized breasts, there are wonderful gifts that you were blessed with that nobody else has been given.

We are all unique and all have a unique, rich set of things to be profoundly grateful for. Maybe you are a fast runner, maybe you are a natural comedian, maybe you have a genius level I.Q., maybe you have a very positive personality, maybe you are very consciously advanced, maybe you have a natural talent for singing, maybe you have many friends. Whatever you have – be grateful for it! Celebrate it! Celebrate your individuality and uniqueness by fully accepting who you are and loving yourself.

Things like changing your external appearance by getting breast implants, buying expensive clothing, and getting rich will only bring you some short-lived happiness. What causes you to shift towards the polarity of unconsciousness is the act of not being grateful for what you’ve already got. For long-lasting happiness and for conscious advancement, accept yourself for who you are and feel truly blessed to have what you’ve got. Take the time to count your blessings, be accepting of yourself and your level of consciousness. Realize that at this current moment you are doing the best that you know how to do in order to advance consciously.

7. Understand your own thought process

An extremely effective way to become more conscious is to take note of your thought process and understand it to the best of your ability. I’ve seen many people run themselves in mental circles due to an ineffective understanding of their own thought process. Being consciously aware of your thoughts and why you are thinking them is an integral step in creating an accurate understanding of your reality.

What causes one person to shed tears of joy, may be a boring event to watch for others. What may feel pleasing to one person may feel extremely painful to a different person. What is one man’s junk is another mans treasure… you get the picture. Everyone has a different internal working model and unique thought processing. To become more conscious is to learn how understand your thoughts and why you think certain thoughts when faced with certain situations within your reality.

A great way to understand your thoughts is to simply be aware of what you are thinking while you are thinking it. I personally recommend meditation to help yourself understand your thinking. Meditation has been proven to boost activity in the left-prefrontal cortex of your brain which allows you to be more aware of your thoughts with less mental effort. Therefore, to supplement your current state of awareness and become more conscious of your thoughts, you may find that meditation proves to be extremely helpful. Once you are aware of your thinking patterns, you can effectively learn to quickly change your reality, belief systems, and understanding of your uniqueness. This is a great situation to put yourself in for conscious advancement.

8. Bless everything that happens; look at the bright side

There are times throughout life when amazing things happen to us and other times when upsetting events take place. Just like accepting who you are and blessing what you are thankful for, you should also learn to bless everything that happens in your life. No matter how bad an event, it has potential to make a positive impact on your life in the long run.

Let’s use an example of a perceived bad event and understand why it should be blessed. Hypothetically, let’s say that you were involved in a crime and thrown in prison. Your life situation is looking extremely grim, but there is still a lot of potential for your life. Here’s where it’s important to recognize [the perceived negative event of] getting thrown in prison as a blessing in disguise. Though you may be in prison, you now have potential to stop your criminal behavior, understand why your actions were wrong, the ability to make some big conscious decisions about your life while you’re locked up, the ability to make positive conscious change, the ability to do push-ups to strengthen your body, the ability to make a positive impact on lives of others in prison, the ability to meditate to strengthen your mind, and the potential to get out of prison earlier than expected! This situation, though initially looking absolutely terrible, has lightened up. Let’s say that you are now out of jail and become a multi-millionaire that has learned to become highly conscious.

In hindsight going to jail could’ve been the best thing that happened to your life to “wake you up” out of your low functioning state and guide your consciousness in a better direction. Who knows, you may still be a criminal if you hadn’t gone to jail. For this reason, it is important to count your blessings and be thankful for what you’ve got in every situation.

Though I did choose somewhat of a bad example, I was still able to demonstrate the ability to bless what appeared as an unfavorable stage of life. The ability to bless everything that happens in your life comes with conscious experience and being able to think positively. No matter what has happened in your life, look back and force yourself to optimistically bless every event. Every event in your life has happened for a reason – whether you are aware or unaware of that reason depends on your current level of consciousness. Blessing everything that happens to you is a highly conscious tool that helps greatly for dealing with life. Your ability to bless and appreciate, even what may be initially perceived as a worst case scenario, will ultimately provide you great conscious satisfaction.

9. Take time for internal reflection; meditate

Taking time for internal reflection is the single most effective way to learn more about yourself and your state of consciousness. Internal reflection will certainly help you better understand your thoughts, emotions, spirituality, and current life situation. Internal reflection is basically the act of meditation. Simply closing your eyes and observing your thoughts can be extremely effective for learning more about your consciousness. Do your best to interpret the feedback that your internal reflection provides.

My favorite internal reflection / meditation practice begins by getting into a comfortable position and consciously focusing all of my awareness on my breathing. I then focus my attention on relaxing individual parts of my body. After I am deeply relaxed, I will shift my attention towards my entire internal state. Usually the subconscious will throw something at me during meditation that may be insightful, may be interesting, or may just be a long-time memory of the past.

No matter what information you are able to extract from your internal reflection, it will help you advance consciously. Sometimes you may not get anything out of your experience with internal reflection, other times you may be bombarded with a plethora of internal information. Be happy with yourself and results and understand that the insight you are provided with was meant to be. The more often you take time to meditate or internally reflect, the better you will understand yourself and be able to create conscious change. If you don’t currently take time to internally reflect: start up a 20 minute meditation routine each morning and observe the difference it quickly makes in your state of consciousness!

10. Focus on advancing consciously; tune out distractions

In the process of conscious development, it’s important to focus exactly on what you are trying to accomplish: the act of becoming more conscious. During this process, it is important to tune out all unhealthy distractions such as: negative relationships, abuse, fighting, illicit drugs, etc. If you allow yourself to become distracted with unhealthy, unconscious habits, then act of advancing consciously will become a much more difficult or slower process than normal.

One very helpful way to ensure conscious advancement is to pack your daily schedule full of healthy habits. Here is the example of a typical day that you could consciously force yourself to have: wake up – go into meditation; after meditation lace up your kicks and go for a run; after your workout, eat a wholesome, healthy breakfast; after your breakfast educate yourself by reading an interesting article; after your reading go to work – while you’re there, make an effort to share your positivity with others by smiling, giving compliments, and making others laugh; after work (maybe on the drive home), use positive incantations to change your belief system; when you get home, celebrate your family by talking with them about their day and spending time with them; after dinner, plan a fun activity (like going bowling) that allows you to express your vibrant energy; after bowling, stop by 4 Mind 4 Life and read another interesting article; finally end your day with a positive visualization of tomorrow; get a good night’s sleep to ensure optimum health. This is just one day that is packed with consciousness boosters. By packing your schedule with consciousness-boosting, healthy roadblocks, it becomes very easy to tune out all distractions and stay focused on your conscious advancement.

Focusing on advancing consciously and tuning out distractions will make the process of your journey become very quick and highly effective. Eliminating all unhealthy patterns and putting up conscious enhancing roadblocks will ultimately help you reach the advanced state of awareness that you were trying to achieve much more quickly. It’s obvious that distractions slow progress – so do away with them! Being unable to tune out distractions will only slow or impede your conscious progress!

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