April 7, 22 Scarcity & Fear

Daily Affirmation: I deserve good things. I choose gratitude and joy. 

Cultivate Gratitude & Joy. Let go of scarcity and fear of the dark.

Excerpt from Gifts of Imperfection, by Brené Brown

There is one guarantee: If we’re not practicing gratitude and allowing ourselves to know joy, we are missing out on the two things that will actually sustain us during the inevitable hard times. What I’m describing above is scarcity of safety and uncertainty. But there are other kinds of scarcity. My friend Lynne Twist has written an incredible book called The Soul of Money. In this book, Lynne addresses the myth of scarcity. She writes, 

For me, and for many of us, our first waking thought of the day is “I didn’t get enough sleep.” The next one is “I don’t have enough time.” Whether true or not, that thought of not enough occurs to us automatically before we even think to question or examine it. We spend most of the hours and the days of our lives hearing, explaining, complaining, or worrying about what we don’t have enough of.… We don’t have enough exercise. We don’t have enough work. We don’t have enough profits. We don’t have enough power. We don’t have enough wilderness. We don’t have enough weekends. Of course, we don’t have enough money—ever. We’re not thin enough, we’re not smart enough, we’re not pretty enough or fit enough or educated or successful enough, or rich enough—ever. Before we even sit up in bed, before our feet touch the floor, we’re already inadequate, already behind, already losing, already lacking something. And by the time we go to bed at night, our minds race with a litany of what we didn’t get, or didn’t get done, that day. We go to sleep burdened by those thoughts and wake up to the reverie of lack.… What begins as a simple expression of the hurried life, or even the challenged life, grows into the great justification for an unfulfilled life.2 

As I read this passage, it makes total sense to me why we’re a nation hungry for more joy: Because we’re starving from a lack of gratitude. Lynne says that addressing scarcity doesn’t mean searching for abundance but rather choosing a mind-set of sufficiency: 

We each have the choice in any setting to step back and let go of the mind-set of scarcity. Once we let go of scarcity, we discover the surprising truth of sufficiency. By sufficiency, I don’t mean a quantity of anything. Sufficiency isn’t two steps up from poverty or one step short of abundance. It isn’t a measure of barely enough or more than enough. Sufficiency isn’t an amount at all. It is an experience, a context we generate, a declaration, a knowing that there is enough, and that we are enough. Sufficiency resides inside of each of us, and we can call it forward. It is a consciousness, an attention, an intentional choosing of the way we think about our circumstances.3

The Certain Decision (Andy Andrews, Sefen Decisions)
I have a decided heart.It’s not about what it IS…It’s about what it can BECOME!
“What you decide in your heart will be done and the light of God will shine on your ways.”Job 22:28
The Certain Decision for personal success is what fuels your actions from the active decision. The clarity of vision you maintain in your mind is directly proportional to the effectiveness of your actions. A decided heart is unwavering in the face of continual challenges and setbacks and that ensures victory and a lifetime of greater fulfillment.

These two practices work together toward a wholehearted life. Let your decided heart cultivate gratitude and joy.