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Written and Narrated by Marie T. Russell

Watch video version on YouTube.

Each one of us is a unique individual, and thus it seems to follow that each one of us has a specific role to play. It's just like in the human body, each part of the whole has a different role to play and is part of the big picture. The whole is incomplete without all the parts. 

The human body without a heart, or a digestive system, or a circulatory system, is incomplete, and is not able to survive. And so it is for the Planetary Body -- without each one of us, it is also incomplete and may not be able to survive.

Free Will

We each have a role to play in this grand experiment of life. Is our role written out for us? Do we have a script we have to adhere to? Or do we have free will to act as we choose?

Perhaps the answer to those questions is "all of the above". We might have entered this life with a script, but we have been modifying the script and improvising as we go along, and so have the other "actors" in our play. 

This brings to mind numerous actors who were known to improvise lines in a movie as it was being filmed. And many times, those lines turned out to be iconic lines that caught on and remained in people's memory and vocabulary. Some of the most famous ones are Humphrey Bogart's "Here's looking at you kid" in the movie Casablanca; Jack Nicholson's "You can't handle the truth" in A Few Good Men'\; as well as "Are you talking to me?" as said by Robert DeNiro in Taxi Driver. (For more of these do a search for improvised famous movie lines.)

So in the same way, we improvise as we go along and that can make the whole difference in our "movie". If we find that a particular dialogue or behavior or attitude is not beneficial for our well-being, we are free to change it. There is no fixed way we must behave, or dress, or talk, or anything. It is completely up to us. 

For us to create happiness, we must remember that we always have a choice as to how to behave, what to say, and what to do. Our thoughts may be harder to navigate as they can come up faster than our process of decision-making. But we do have a choice as to which thought we will choose to act out in our encounters with others, which thoughts will become part of our regular "programming", and which thoughts we will choose to let pass by unacted upon or unspoken.

Courage

Courage is not an esoteric quality or talent. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary: "...courage is the ability to do something that you know is difficult or dangerous." That's it. So it just requires that we choose to do something, even when we have fear about it. 

Being true to ourselves should be the easiest thing to do. However, because of our early programming, upbringing, and shaming experiences, it often seems like it's the most difficult thing to do. It takes courage to be ourselves, to stand up for ourselves, to speak our truth. 

It takes strength, courage and will-power to face our fears, as well as to see our desires, dreams, and goals through to their completion. It takes courage and persistence to stay the course. It takes courage and strength to remain true to ourselves in the face of challenges, put-downs, failures, and lack of support from others (and possibly from ourselves).

However, the greatest gift we can give ourselves and the world, is to be 100% true to ourselves. This is who we are meant to be. This is our role in the play of life. This is our piece of the puzzle. When you doubt yourself, take a deep breath and remember that you are unique, you are the star of your own show, and you are the hero/heroine of your life drama. You were born to be YOU! Go for it!


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Safety

One of the greatest impediments to live up to our potential is fear... fear of rejection, fear of ridicule, fear of failure, fear of being unloved, unwanted, unappreciated, etc...

However, fear is not the opposite of courage. Fear is a normal reaction to life's situations... it originates in the physical world where fears come up in life-threatening events... fear of being attacked by a tiger, an alligator, a cobra... in other words, fear of death in some form or another. And this fear also resides in our ego which is afraid of loss of control, which it sees as its own death.

The good news is that courage does not require the absence of fear. Courage is taking action despite the fear, or perhaps, due to the fear. Rather than freeze and remain stuck in our old ruts, we face our fear (and the people and things that incite our fear) and refuse to be cowed into submission, into inactivity, or into an inappropriate reaction. We take a deep breath, choose to trust in the support of Life itself, and affirm: I am safe! Then we take another deep breath, and do what we must do to get past the fear and into the wonderful future that awaits our presence.

Letting Go

Sometimes. the courage we need is the courage to let go, to stop the forward momentum of whatever we are doing, and let go of our attachment to how we think things should be.

Letting go can require as much courage as keeping on. When we let go of our plans, our goals, and our belief in how things are "supposed" to be, we have to trust in things working out for the highest good... and that takes courage.

Rather than fight the current, we have to let go and float with it... not knowing where it will lead us. And that takes faith in Life itself and trusting that no matter what, we are always safe, and we are always exactly where we need to be when we need to be. 

Potential

No matter what we've done in the past and what we haven't done, we are full of potential. We are a work in progress, still on the road to becoming all that we are meant to be.

We may be filled with doubts of what we can attain and become. We may be filled with fears that we aren't good enough or smart enough, or "something" enough to fulfill our potential. We may have a history of being "not good enough" either in our own eyes or in the eyes of people in our lives.

However, choosing to have faith in ourselves, our possibilities, and our future gives us the courage to take the steps we need to take to become whole, to become completely fulfilled in our being. Right now we are only a portion of what we can be. But step by step, day by day, with courage and persistence, we will attain the fullness of who we truly are.

Greatness

It takes courage to express our greatness, our wonderfulness, our divineness. We are so used to demeaning ourselves, deflecting compliments, and living as if we are inconsequential.

Marianne Williamson said it best in her book, Return to Love:

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness
That most frightens us.

We ask ourselves
Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.

Your playing small
Does not serve the world.
There's nothing enlightened about shrinking
So that other people won't feel insecure around you.

We are all meant to shine,
As children do.
We were born to make manifest
The glory of God that is within us.

It's not just in some of us;
It's in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine,
We unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we're liberated from our own fear,
Our presence automatically liberates others.

It is time for us to claim our greatness, our wonderfulness, our innate power. 

Freedom

It takes courage to express ourselves openly, truthfully, yet lovingly. It takes courage to express who we are even when others do not understand or accept us. It takes courage to respectfully stand up for who we are and what we believe in.

Giving ourselves permission to express ourselves even in the face of ridicule or judgment is very liberating. Rather than suppress our true self, we allow our inner child and inner self to come out in the open for all to see.

In this way we discover true freedom... the freedom to be true to ourselves and to our heart's yearning for self-expression. True freedom is following our inner guidance, expressing our inner voice, and letting Love guide us in every step we take.
  

Article inspired from:

Chakra Cards for Belief Change: The Healing InSight Method
by Nikki Gresham-Record

COVER ART FOR: Chakra Cards for Belief Change: The Healing InSight Method by Nikki Gresham-RecordAn easy-to-use therapy tool for transforming unhelpful belief patterns and envisioning positive change:

• Identifies 28 beliefs per chakra that can be energetically realigned using the Healing InSight Method 
• Offers a tool set of therapeutic processes, affirmations, visualization, and bodywork for the practical application of the transformational belief realignment method
• Includes 56 full-color, high-vibration chakra images, one for each main chakra as well as 7 additional empowering images for each chakra

Info/Order this card deck.

More Inspirational Card Decks 

About The Author

Marie T. Russell is the founder of InnerSelf Magazine (founded 1985). She also produced and hosted a weekly South Florida radio broadcast, Inner Power, from 1992-1995 which focused on themes such as self-esteem, personal growth, and well-being. Her articles focus on transformation and reconnecting with our own inner source of joy and creativity.

Creative Commons 3.0: This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 License. Attribute the author: Marie T. Russell, InnerSelf.com. Link back to the article: This article originally appeared on InnerSelf.com