When I look back on the past three decades, I recognize a basic fact that I think is true of many people:  Had I been asked to project what would be happening in my life, or what I would have accomplished, I would never have been able to imagine what has actually transpired.  I would never have said I would publish four books, be on television and radio, offer workshops to both public and professional audiences, become an Interfaith minister, or even live in New York City full time for some 26 years now.  I was trained, in my family and community, to be modest and humble, and not to imagine great things for myself.  In other words, I would have imagined a life much smaller than what has actually emerged.

Over these decades, what has become a central belief for me is the conviction that Life wants to live us as fully as possible and that one of the gifts we can offer back to Life is to say “yes” to the best and greatest of what wants to express through us.  This may mean experiencing some discomfort if, as I was, you were raised to be modest, or not to think of yourself as a source of power or leadership.

And so, for this week’s experiment, I invite you to begin to play with where you may hold yourself back . . . where you may think too small about what’s possible for you.  I also want to make a distinction between not thinking too small versus falling into the grandiose fantasies that tend to be a protection against feelings of vulnerability.  There’s a difference in the quality of these kinds of fantasies and the quality of saying “yes” to the best that wants to emerge in us.  One of the differences is that the best in us tends to emerge spontaneously and organically.  We feel drawn to a particular activity or study, or we feel drawn to be in a certain kind of environment, with certain kinds of people, but these inclinations aren’t accompanied by fantasies of how fabulously we will be acknowledged or how famous we will become.  That doesn’t mean that recognition isn’t often a companion to saying “yes” to what’s best in us.  It just means that there is a natural acceptance of what naturally accompanies the experience of becoming more of what we can be - that tends to emerge effortlessly as part of saying “yes”.

In order to explore whether you’re thinking too small, imagine something you’d like to accomplish and then play with imagining it just a little bit bigger and better.  Then, notice your response.  What happens in your body?  What thoughts pop into your mind?  What images emerge?  It’s a gift to become aware of the ways in which you may have learned to hold yourself back.  This awareness can offer a choice point where you can begin to experiment with saying “yes” to more than you can imagine.

In the future-self work I do with people – and in my own process – one of the main components is this willingness to say “yes” to our potential without having to know ahead of time where that potential will lead or how it will express itself.  Over the 28 years that I’ve been working with the future self, I have come to trust the process of saying “yes” to the best in each of us – that our willingness jumpstarts a natural unfolding of our potential.

As with all the experiments, remember to bring along curiosity as your constant companion and allow yourself to relate to judgments gently.  Anytime you allow yourself to stretch beyond your comfort zone, or beyond family and community values and expectations, judgments can emerge and intensify any discomfort you may feel.  Learning to notice judgments without grabbing hold of them, or pushing them away, allows you to stay in a state of awareness, of noticing without reacting.  Then, as you “come into bloom” in ways that are beyond your imagining, you can enjoy the process of discovery as you notice the quality of your inner being and outer activities.