Expand Your Vision Quotes

Don’t underestimate the power of vision and direction. These are irresistible forces, able to transform what might appear to be unconquerable obstacles into traversable pathways and expanding opportunities. Strengthen the individual. Start with yourself. Take care with yourself. Define who you are. Refine your personality. Choose your destination and articulate your Being. As the great nineteenth-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche so brilliantly noted, “He whose life has a why can bear almost any how.

Even the smallest changes in our daily routine can create incredible ripple effects that expand our vision of what is possible.

Be around those who crave new galaxies in you. The light through your veins. Poetic science. Wider vision. Gentler strength. The moon in your chest. Gravitational pulls. Possibility everywhere. Stars in your eyes. Expanding horizons. Something wild. Something fervent. Something stunning. Something divine.

Reading a book is a lot like climbing a mountain.” “What do you mean?” His curiosity piqued, Rintaro had finally looked up from his book. His grandfather wafted his teacup slowly under his nose as if savoring the aroma of the tea. “Reading isn’t only for pleasure or entertainment. Sometimes you need to examine the same lines deeply, read the same sentences over again. Sometimes you sit there, head in hands, only progressing at a painstakingly slow pace. And the result of all this hard work and careful study is that suddenly you’re there and your field of vision expands. It’s like finding a great view at the end of a long climbing trail.

Nothing is unbelievable, just expand your vision.

As you build trust in yourself, your ability to expand your vision and fully live in your magnificence is amplified.

Reading isn’t only for pleasure or entertainment. Sometimes you need to examine the same lines deeply, read the same sentences over again. Sometimes you sit there, head in hands, only progressing at a painstakingly slow pace. And the result of all this hard work and careful study is that suddenly you’re there and your field of vision expands. It’s like finding a great view at the end of a long climbing trail.

Understand: as an individual you cannot stop the tide of fantasy and escapism sweeping a culture. But you can stand as an individual bulwark to this trend and create power for yourself. You were born with the greatest weapon in all of nature—the rational, conscious mind. It has the power to expand your vision far and wide, giving you the unique capacity to distinguish patterns in events, learn from the past, glimpse into the future, see through appearances. Circumstances are conspiring to dull that weapon and render it useless by turning you inward and making you afraid of reality. Consider it war. You must fight this tendency as best you can and move in the opposite direction. You must turn outward and become a keen observer of all that is around you. You are doing battle against all the fantasies that are thrown at you. You are tightening your connection to the environment. You want clarity, not escape and confusion. Moving in this direction will instantly bring you power among so many dreamers.

Men and women are learning animals. If you do not see what they have learned, you're blind. They are creatures ever changing, ever improving, ever expanding their vision and the capacity of their hearts. You are not fair to them when you speak of this as the most bloody century; you are not seeing the light that shines ever more radiantly on account of the darkness; you are not. seeing the evolution of the human soul!… …True, what you say about war. Yes, and the cries of the dying, I too have heard them; we have all heard them, through all the decades; and even now, the world is shocked by daily reports of armed conflict. But it is the outcry against these horrors which is the light I speak of; it's the attitudes which were never possible in the past. It is the intolerance of thinking men and women in power who for the first time in the history of the human race truly want to put an end to injustice in all forms. -- Marius to Akasha (The Vampire Chronicles)

The Lord will make much more out of your life than you can by yourself. He will increase your opportunities, expand your vision, and strengthen you. He will give you the help you need to meet your trials and challenges. You will … come to know your Father in Heaven and His Son, Jesus Christ, and feel Their love for you.

Dear daughter, you are enough. You’re beautiful. You’re intelligent. You’re important. You’re protected. You’re loved. You’re useful. Fill yourself with positive thoughts. Feed your soul with kindness. Surround your environment with people whose interest is to expand your vision. I love you. But due to time, I may never say it enough. Thus, my words represent the intense positive emotions I have for you. There will be times when I am not physically with you, but in those times, I’ll be with you in spirit, love and thought. You’re my perfect gift. And you’ve arrived at the perfect time to serve a perfect purpose. Know yourself. Never stop learning about yourself. Strengthen your mental state because negative people may try to attack it. Pray and meditate should you meet obstacles. Never settle for what makes you feel pain, regret, sadness, or disappointments. You’re worth what God says you’re worth, and nothing less.

Once the rain starts falling it’s hard to tell it to stop. I guess it stops in its own time. My tears, like the rain, kept falling as I made my way home through blurry vision. In truth it’s difficult to describe a broken heart. All I know is that unimaginable pain centers in your chest and radiates out, this throbbing, sharp ache that causes almost incapacitation. But there’s more than the ache. Denial lodges itself in your throat, and that lump is its own kind of pain. The affliction of heartbreak can also be found in a knot in your stomach. The knot contracts and expands, contracts and expands, until you’re pretty sure you’re not going to be able to hold down the vomit.

What will make ALONE look good to you? You have to work on that. Because single life needs to look really, really good. You have to believe in it if you’re going to hold out for that rare guy who makes you feel like all of your ideas start rapidly expanding and approaching infinity when you talk to him. You need to have a vision of life alone, stretching into the future, and you need to think about how to make that vision rich and full and pretty. You have to put on an artist’s mind-set and get creative and paint a portrait of yourself alone that’s breathtaking. You have to bring the full force of who you are and what you love to that project. And then you go out into the world with an open heart, and you let people into your life, and you listen, and you embrace them for who they are. You make new friends. You do new things that make you feel more like the strong single woman who owns the world that’s in your vision. And you don’t sleep with anyone until things are much warmer than lukewarm. And you accept that if things are lukewarm after that, you will be forced to kick a motherfucker to the curb, but with kindness, with forgiveness.

Going into wide-angle vision and learning to relax can activate an alpha state. In wide-angle vision, you expand your vision so that you can see out the periphery of your eyes. Take a deep breath, exhale, and expand your vision so that you can see out of the periphery of your eyes, and you will activate the alpha state.

To live a truly spiritual life, you need to take time at least once a day to bring your vision inward, to connect with your true self, your attention having been focused outside all day.

Dear daughter, you are enough. You’re beautiful. You’re intelligent. You’re important. You’re protected. You’re loved. You’re useful. Fill yourself up with positive thoughts. Feed your soul with kindness. Surround your environment with people whose interest is to expand your vision. I love you. But due to time, I may never say it enough. Thus, my words represent the intense positive emotions I have for you. There will be times when I am not physically with you, but in those times, I’ll be with you in spirit, love and thought. You’re my perfect gift. And you’ve arrived at the perfect time to serve a perfect purpose. Know yourself. Never stop learning about yourself. Strengthen your mental state because negative people may try to attack it. Pray and meditate should you meet obstacles. Never settle for what makes you feel pain, regret, sadness, or disappointments. You’re worth what God says you’re worth, and nothing less.

Personal branding is about standing for something in a big way and asserting yourself honestly and boldly. It’s about casting aside the limitations and pressures imposed by what you’ve been told that you can or cannot be or do and expanding your vision, going for the very best and becoming your very best.

Some people are naturally solitary. They want to live lone lives, and are content. Most, however, have a need for enduring, close relationships. These provide both a psychic and social framework for personal growth, under­standing, and development. It is an easy enough matter to shout to the skies: "I love my fellow men," when on the other hand you ronn no strong, enduring relationship with others. It is easy to claim an equal love for all members of the species, but love itself requires an understanding that at your level of activity is based upon intimate experience. You cannot love someone you do not know-not unless you water down the definition of love so much that it becomes meaningless. To love someone, you must appreciate how that per­son differs from yourself and from others. You must hold that person in mind so that to some extent love is a kind of meditation-a loving focus upon another individual. Once you experience that kind of love you can translate it into other tenns. The love itself spreads out, expands, so that you can then see others in love's light. Love is naturally creative and explorative-that is, you want to creatively explore the aspects of the beloved one. Even characteristics that would otherwise appear as mults attain a certain loving significance. They are accepted­seen, and yet they make no difference. Because these are still attributes of the beloved one, even the seeming faults are redeemed. The beloved attains prominence over all others. The span of a god's love can perhaps equally hold within its vision the existences of all individuals at one time in an infinite loving glance that beholds each person, seeing each with all his or her peculiar characteristics and tendencies. Such a god's glance would delight in each person's difference from each other person. This would not be a blanket love, a soupy porridge of a glance in which individuality melted, but a love based on a full understand­ing of each individual. The emotion of love brings you closest to an understanding of the nature of All That Is. Love incites dedication, commitment. It specifies. You cannot, therefore, honestly insist that you love humanity and all people equally if you do not love one other person. If you do not love yourself, it is quite difficult to love another.

Tomorrow’s Promise Don’t be afraid—you’re not going to be embarrassed. Don’t hold back—you’re not going to come up short. You’ll forget all about the humiliations of your youth, and the indignities of being a widow will fade from memory. For your Maker is your bridegroom, his name, GOD-of-the-Angel-Armies! Your Redeemer is The Holy of Israel, known as God of the whole earth. ISAIAH 54:4–5 THE MESSAGE May God expand your territory, enlarge your vision, and increase your capacity for His influence in your life. May you be quick to hear, quick to obey, and quick to trust Him with every detail of your life. As you consider His faithfulness today, may you walk faithfully to your next place of promise tomorrow. He has been faithful. He will be faithful. Rest assured of that.

Elisha was a man of vision, a man of revelation, and he never let go of it. What about you? I don’t know what prophetic promise the Lord may have spoken to you. As Christians, we have the biblical promises as well as the current-day revelatory words that are spoken into each of our lives, which come in a multiplicity of manners. Sometimes they come by the quiet, still witness of the Spirit; at other times, through dreams or visions. They may come from God directly to you or through someone speaking to you what they have received from God. Whatever the case, don’t cast away your dream, for it will have a great reward. Don’t take off your dream coat in the presence of your enemy. Keep the vision God has given you before your eyes. Vision is a power that sustains a people.

There is, in sanest hours, a consciousness, a thought that rises, independent, lifted out from all else, calm, like the stars, shining eternal. This is the thought of identity — yours for you, whoever you are, as mine for me. Miracle of miracles, beyond statement, most spiritual and vaguest of earth’s dreams, yet hardest basic fact, and only entrance to all facts. In such devout hours, in the midst of the significant wonders of heaven and earth, (significant only because of the Me in the centre,) creeds, conventions, fall away and become of no account before this simple idea. Under the luminousness of real vision, it alone takes possession, takes value. Like the shadowy dwarf in the fable, once liberated and look’d upon, it expands over the whole earth, and spreads to the roof of heaven.

Reading isn't only for pleasure or entertainment. Sometimes you need to examine the same lines deeply, read the same sentences over again. Sometimes you sit there, head in hands, only progressing at a painstakingly slow pace. And the result of all this hard work and careful study is that suddenly you're there and your field of vision expands. It's like finding a great view at the end of a long climbing trail.

You were right. I finally found you. Though I would see your face in visions from time to time, this agreement is hard on me still. I don’t know why we do it this way. Why we choose to suffer over the freedom of the astral plain, over an expanded consciousness and boundless awareness. Why can’t I forget you? I’m doomed to long for you with every birth. To chase you until I catch you. And when I do… bliss.

We owe all to Jesus crucified. What is your life, my brethren, but the cross? Whence comes the bread of your soul but from the cross? What is your joy but the cross? What is your delight, what is your heaven, but the Blessed One, once crucified for you, who ever liveth to make intercession for you? Cling to the cross, then, put both arms around it! Hold to the Crucified, and never let Him go. Come afresh to the cross at this moment, and rest there now and for ever! Then, with the power of God resting upon you, go forth and preach the cross! Tell out the story of the bleeding Lamb. Repeat the wondrous tale, and nothing else. Never mind how you do it, only proclaim that Jesus died for sinner. The cross held up by a babe’s hands is just as powerful as if a giant held it up. The power lies in the word itself, or rather in the Holy Spirit who works by it and with it. O glorious Christ, when I have had a vision of Thy cross, I have seen it at first like a common gibbet, and Thou wast hanging on it like a felon; but, as I have looked, I have seen it begin to rise, and tower aloft till it has reached the highest heaven, and by its mighty power has lifted up myriads to the throne of God. I have seen its arms extend and expand until they have embraced all the earth. I have seen the foot of it go down deep as our helpless miseries are; and what a vision I have had of Thy magnificence, O Thou crucified One! Brethren, believe in the power of the cross for the conversion of those around you. Do not say of any man that he cannot be saved. The blood of Jesus is omnipotent. Do not say of any district that it is too sunken, or of any class of men that they are too far gone: the word of the cross reclaims the lost. Believe it to be the power of God, and you shall find it so. Believe in Christ crucified, and preach boldly in His name, and you shall see great and gladsome things. Do not doubt the ultimate triumph of Christianity. Do not let a mistrust flit across your soul. The cross must conquer; it must blossom with a crown, a crown commensurate with the person of the Crucified, and the bitterness of His agony. His reward shall parallel His sorrows. Trust in God, and lift your banner high, and now with psalms and songs advance to battle, for the Lord of hosts is with us, the Son of the Highest leads our van. Onward, with blast of silver trumpet and shout of those that seize the spoil. Let no man’s heart fail him! Christ hath died! Atonement is complete! God is satisfied! Peace is proclaimed! Heaven glitters with proofs of mercy already bestowed upon ten thousand times ten thousand! Hell is trembling, heaven adoring, earth waiting. Advance, ye saints, to certain victory! You shall overcome through the blood of the Lamb.

It’s so interesting how transparency works. Not only can you see yourself when you open, relax, show up fully, and allow vulnerability to be natural, but that empowers others to see more of you—and of themselves. On the other hand, when you’re open, exposed, and undefended without even trying, you can see through layers of interference or illusions of opacity in people and situations that used to stop you. You have Superman’s X-ray vision!" —from Transparency: Seeing Through to Our Expanded Human Capacity

When planning and setting goals, it’s important to oscillate intentionally and often between your personal daily reality and your highest vision. Your destiny evolves along with everyone else’s, so you can’t lock in plans for very long; they must be fluid and in the moment. Problem solving and planning in the Intuition Age change your experience of time and working with timelines, as you realize that past and future are being absorbed into an expanded present moment, accelerating the materialization process. Timelines are affected by the choices and plans of all people and must be checked often.

1. Making happiness a high priority. Versus: Coasting along with our present state of happiness and unhappiness. 2. Making sure your life has purpose and meaning. Versus: Focusing on daily practicalities, even those that seem routine and meaningless. 3. Living according to a higher vision. Versus: Living for externals like a better job, more money, a bigger house, etc. 4. Expanding your awareness in every decade of life. Versus: Viewing youth as the peak of life and old age as a dwindling decline. 5. Devoting time and attention to personal growth. Versus: Staying the same as you always were and feeling proud about it. 6. Following a sensible regimen of good diet and physical activity. Versus: Eating a diet high in sugar, fat, and calories. Promising yourself to exercise tomorrow, or next week. 7. Allowing your brain to reset by introducing downtime several times a day.

Sun Dance makes me strong. Sun Dance takes place inside of me, not outside of me. I pierce the flesh of my being. I offer my flesh to the Great Spirit, the Great Mystery, Wakan Tanka. To give your flesh to Spirit is to give your life. And what you have given you can no longer lose. Sun Dance is our religion, our strength. We take great pride in that strength, which enables us to resist pain, torture, any trial rather than betray the People. That's why, in the past, when the enemy tortured us with knives, bullwhips, even fire, we were able to withstand the pain. That strength still exists among us. When you give your flesh, when you're pierced in Sun Dance, you feel every bit of that pain, every iota. Not one jot is spared you. And yet there is a separation, a detachment, a greater mind that you become part of, so that you both feel the pain and see yourself feeling the pain. And then, somehow, the pain becomes contained, limited. As the white-hot sun pours molten through your eyes into your inner being, as the skewers implanted in your chest pull and yank and rip at your screaming flesh, a strange and powerful lucidity gradually expands within your mind. The pain explodes into a bright white light, into revelation. You are given a wordless vision of what it is to be in touch with all Being and all beings. And for the rest of your life, once you have made that sacrifice of your flesh to the Great Mystery, you will never forget that greater reality of which we are each an intimate and essential part and which holds each of us in an embrace as loving as mother's arms. Every time a pin pricks your finger from then on, that little pain will be but a tiny reminder of that larger pain and of the still greater reality that exists within each of us, an infinite realm beyond reach of all pain. There even the most pitiable prisoner can find solace. So Sun Dance made even prison life sustainable for me. I am undestroyed. My life is my Sun Dance.

This story is always yours for the telling. This has always been yours. You can expand to fill it all or take up the smallest corner. You can write in invisible ink. You can tell your story in red wine stains and spilled ink and bite marks. You can only write in pencil so it can always be erased. You can write in layers, and turn the page and write sideways. You can spin spiral and make your words dance. You can ink it on the surface of your skin or x-ray vision the story onto the blank canvas of your bones. You can write a novel and then let the whole thing dissolve in the waves. You can write the truth and bury it in the ground, throw it in the fire, fold it into paper airplanes and watch it fly, roll it into a note in a bottle and toss it in the ocean and let it find its own way home. Or, you share it with the whole fucking world. You can care and not care and care-not-care all at once. But you get to write. And you get to choose the story you tell. And there’s no freedom bigger or bolder or braver than that.

Iain MacGregor,” she whispered longingly, looking up. The woods were quiet. Strips of moonlight shone through tree limbs that reached like surreal black fingertips across her vision. A single tear slid down her cheek. She touched her mouth, imagining his kiss. Taking a small pocket knife out of her cargo pants, she looked about. A mystic had once told her that if she left pieces of herself around while she lived, it would expand her haunting territory when she died. Jane wasn’t sure she believed in sideshow magic tricks—or the Old Magick as the mystic had spelled it on her sign. She had no idea what had possessed her to talk to the palm reader and ask about ghosts. Still, just in case, she was leaving her stamp all over the woods. She cut her palm and pressed it to a nearby tree under a branch. Holding the wound to the rough bark stung at first, but then it made her feel better. This forest wouldn’t be a bad eternity. The sound of running feet erupted behind her and she stiffened. No one ever came out here at night. She’d walked the woods hundreds of times. Her mind instantly went to the creepy girl ghosts chanting by the stream. “Whoohoo!” Jane whipped around, startled as a streak of naked flesh sprinted past her. The Scottish voice was met with loud cheers from those who followed him. “Water’s this way, lads, or my name isn’t Raibeart MacGregor, King of the Highlands!” Another naked man dashed through the forest after him. “It smells of freedom.” Jane stayed hidden in the branches, undetected, with her hand pressed to the bark. “Aye, freedom from your proper Cait,” Raibeart answered, his voice coming through the dark where he’d disappeared into the trees. “Murdoch, stop him before he reaches town. Cait will not teleport ya out of jail again,” a third man yelled, not running quite so fast. “Raibeart, ya are goin’ the wrong way!” “Och, Angus, my Cait canna live without me,” Murdoch, the second streaker, answered. “She’ll always come to my rescue.” “I said stop him, Murdoch, we’re new to this place.” Angus skidded to a stop and lifted his jaw, as if sensing he was being watched. He looked in her direction and instantly covered his manhood as his eyes caught Jane’s shocked face in the tree limbs. “Oh, lassie.” “Oh, naked man,” Jane teased before she could stop herself. “That I am,” Angus answered, “but there is an explanation for it.” “I don’t think some things need explained,” Jane said.

Universe of My Love I have loved you; why, when, how. I do not know, I have loved you for your beautiful smile and for your mysterious glow, With which you fill my life offering me a sense of completeness, That invades me with your love’s stillness, Your love, my emotions, my sentiments and my entire existence, It feels like the most beautiful moment of reality with no hint of pretence, Inside me I feel you flowing in my senses, And there hidden from the world, just you and I and our romances, Kisses of love, thoughts of togetherness and basking in your beauty, Everything within me and outside me regards you as its patron deity, In the night’s anonymity your thoughts are my only gladdening acquaintance, And I willingly accept my, self-decreed sentence, To become your prisoner, your admirer enslaved forever, With the hope that someday in my humble submissions you will discover your lover, Who loves you, only you. Why? I do not wish to know, As long as in your eyes I see a reflection of my own life's flow, So sleep my love Irma, but please never close your eyes, For whenever you do so something within me dies, You are my end and you are my beginning too, I am the river and you are the always waiting sea that I restlessly flow to, In you I have seen my heaven and daylight, In this universe of mine you are my only starlight, You are my visions and my always longed for that beauty's ultimate sight, Let me hold your hair Irma, let me look into your eyes and be together every day and night, Fill the emptiness of my life with your sparkling eyes, Le me place my tired head under your hair and drift far and wide into these dark skies, Of this familiar universe that your presence creates for me, Let us be in this state forever my love; the ever expanding universe, and you with me!

To give you a sense of the sheer volume of unprocessed information that comes up the spinal cord into the thalamus, let’s consider just one aspect: vision, since many of our memories are encoded this way. There are roughly 130 million cells in the eye’s retina, called cones and rods; they process and record 100 million bits of information from the landscape at any time. This vast amount of data is then collected and sent down the optic nerve, which transports 9 million bits of information per second, and on to the thalamus. From there, the information reaches the occipital lobe, at the very back of the brain. This visual cortex, in turn, begins the arduous process of analyzing this mountain of data. The visual cortex consists of several patches at the back of the brain, each of which is designed for a specific task. They are labeled V1 to V8. Remarkably, the area called V1 is like a screen; it actually creates a pattern on the back of your brain very similar in shape and form to the original image. This image bears a striking resemblance to the original, except that the very center of your eye, the fovea, occupies a much larger area in V1 (since the fovea has the highest concentration of neurons). The image cast on V1 is therefore not a perfect replica of the landscape but is distorted, with the central region of the image taking up most of the space. Besides V1, other areas of the occipital lobe process different aspects of the image, including: •  Stereo vision. These neurons compare the images coming in from each eye. This is done in area V2. •  Distance. These neurons calculate the distance to an object, using shadows and other information from both eyes. This is done in area V3. •  Colors are processed in area V4. •  Motion. Different circuits can pick out different classes of motion, including straight-line, spiral, and expanding motion. This is done in area V5. More than thirty different neural circuits involved with vision have been identified, but there are probably many more. From the occipital lobe, the information is sent to the prefrontal cortex, where you finally “see” the image and form your short-term memory. The information is then sent to the hippocampus, which processes it and stores it for up to twenty-four hours. The memory is then chopped up and scattered among the various cortices. The point here is that vision, which we think happens effortlessly, requires billions of neurons firing in sequence, transmitting millions of bits of information per second. And remember that we have signals from five sense organs, plus emotions associated with each image. All this information is processed by the hippocampus to create a simple memory of an image. At present, no machine can match the sophistication of this process, so replicating it presents an enormous challenge for scientists who want to create an artificial hippocampus for the human brain.

Never treat your launch team like a core group. It’s not. Your launch team is a time-limited, purpose-driven team. It ends with the debriefing session following your launch. At that meeting, release the launch team members to join a ministry team of their choice. Your launch team will not stay with you over the long haul. Many church planters make the mistake of thinking that the people from their launch team (whom they have grown to love) will be the same people who will grow the church with them in the long term. That is seldom, if ever, the case. While it’s sad to see people go, it’s part of God’s process in growing your church. So, expect it, be prepared for it, and be thankful that you have the opportunity to serve with so many different people at different points along the journey. Preparing a launch team to maximize your first service is first and foremost a spiritual enterprise. Pray and fast—a lot. Don’t be fooled into thinking that being a solid leader undermines the spirit of teamwork. You can lead a team, hold people accountable and ensure that things get done in a way that fosters teamwork and gives glory to God. So get ready. show people your heart before you ask for their hand. People want to know that you care, and they want to be part of something bigger than themselves. If you can articulate your vision in a way that excites people, they’ll want to be on your team. The launch team is not a democracy. Don’t vote. You are the leader. Lead. While it’s true that you want to share the gospel with as many people as possible, you will need to develop a clear picture of the specific demographic your new church is targeting in order to effectively reach the greatest number of people. Diffused light has little impact, but focused light has the ability to cut through steel. Take time to focus so that you are able to reach the specific people God has called you to. 1. Who Are the Key Population Groups Living in My Area? 2. What Population Group Is Not Being Reached Effectively? 3. What Population Group Do I Best Relate To? Healthy organisms grow, and that includes your church. If you feel stagnation setting in, your job is not to push growth any way you can but to identify the barriers that are hindering you and remove them. The only people who like full rooms are preachers and worship leaders. If you ignore this barrier, your church will stop growing. Early on, it’s best to remain flexible. The last thing you want to do is get in a position in which God can’t grow you because you aren’t logistically prepared. What if twice as many people showed up this Sunday? Would you be ready? When a lead pastor isn’t growing: The church stops growing, the sermons are stale, The staff and volunteers stop growing, The passion for ministry wanes. Keeping your church outwardly focused is just as important now as it was during your prelaunch stage. Make sure that you are continually working to expand God’s kingdom, not building your own. A healthy launch is the single greatest indicator of future church health.

How can we say that we honor and respect God if we are not seeking to show honor and respect to the parents He created for us?

Heavenly Father, give me a vision of all You want to do in my life. Help me to not think too small, even when I pray. I want to be available to whatever You have for me and not limit Your blessings by being unprepared to receive them. Enlarge my heart and mind to understand how You can take what I have and expand it beyond what I can imagine.

positive and helpful effects on you and the society as a whole!). True leaders—teenage to middle-age—are committed and act in ways that take into consideration purposeful outcomes or a vision, with focus, passion, and resilience. They develop and then follow a clear road map to get from where they are to where they desire to be. What does pragmatic psychology mean to you, specifically? Allow me to expand a bit on what I mean when I talk about pragmatic psychology, if it hasn’t yet begun to crystallize for you. Your psychology comprises (1) your belief system, which projects your character and narrative about yourself and is the glue

Morgan retaliated with a strategy that would become one of his hallmarks. He spread rumors to Wall Street that Westinghouse’s company was financially unstable, which dissuaded investors from giving Westinghouse the capital that he needed to expand the production and installation of his alternating current generators. Morgan then began an attack through stock manipulation, and moved to gain control of The Westinghouse Corporation, and thus Tesla’s patents. By the end of 1897, Westinghouse was nearly bankrupt, and it looked as though Morgan would usurp everything that Tesla and Westinghouse had built together. Westinghouse owed Tesla over $1 million in royalties, an amount that grew daily. When Westinghouse described to Tesla the desperate situation, Tesla replied with the following: “Mr. Westinghouse, you have been my friend, you believed in me when others had no faith; you were brave enough to go ahead when others lacked courage; you supported me when even your own engineers lacked vision. ... Here is your contract, and here is my contract. I will tear them both to pieces, and you will no longer have any troubles from my royalties.” In time, these royalties would’ve made Tesla the world’s first billionaire. Instead, they enabled Westinghouse to save his company. Tesla’s selflessness was a testament not only to his generosity and goodwill, but his belief in his ability to continue to create his future.

We owe all to Jesus crucified. What is your life, my brethren, but the cross? Whence comes the bread of your soul but from the cross? What is your joy but the cross? What is your delight, what is your heaven, but the Blessed One, once crucified for you, who ever liveth to make intercession for you? Cling to the cross, then, Put both arms around it! Hold to the Crucified, and never let Him go. Come afresh to the cross at this moment, and rest there now and for ever! Then, with the power of God resting upon you, go forth and preach the cross! Tell out the story of the bleeding Lamb. Repeat the wondrous tale, and nothing else. Never mind how you do it, only proclaim that Jesus died for sinner. The cross held up by a babe’s hands is just as powerful as if a giant held it up. The power lies in the word itself, or rather in the Holy Spirit who works by it and with it. O glorious Christ, when I have had a vision of Thy cross, I have seen it at first like a common gibbet, and Thou wast hanging on it like a felon; but, as I have looked, I have seen it begin to rise, and tower aloft till it has reached the highest heaven, and by its mighty power has lifted up myriads to the throne of God. I have seen its arms extend and expand until they have embraced all the earth. I have seen the foot of it go down deep as our helpless miseries are; and what a vision I have had of Thy magnificence, O Thou crucified One! Brethren, believe in the power of the cross for the conversion of those around you. Do not say of any man that he cannot be saved. The blood of Jesus is omnipotent. Do not say of any district that it is too sunken, or of any class of men that they are too far gone: the word of the cross reclaims the lost. Believe it to be the power of God, and you shall find it so. Believe in Christ crucified, and preach boldly in His name, and you shall see great and gladsome things. Do not doubt the ultimate triumph of Christianity. Do not let a mistrust flit across your soul. The cross must conquer; it must blossom with a crown, a crown commensurate with the person of the Crucified, and the bitterness of His agony. His reward shall parallel His sorrows. Trust in God, and lift you banner high, and now with psalms and songs advance to battle, for the Lord of hosts is with us, the Son of the Highest leads our van. Onward, with blast of silver trumpet and shout of those that seize the spoil. Let no man’s heart fail him! Christ hath died! Atonement is complete! God is satisfied! Peace is proclaimed! Heaven glitters with proofs of mercy already bestowed upon ten thousand times ten thousand! Hell is trembling, heaven adoring, earth waiting. Advance, ye saints, to certain victory! You shall overcome through the blood of the Lamb.

Jesus had enough vision to think small. Focusing did not limit his influence — it expanded it. When Jesus ascended to the Father, he knew that there were at least eleven who could minister under the authority of his name, an elevenfold multiplication of his ministry. Robert Coleman captures the heart of Jesus’ methodology when he writes, “[Jesus’] concern was not with programs to reach the multitudes but with men the multitudes would follow.

Suppose a soft glow appears behind your eyes. Very gently you bring your attention to the light. You don’t try to hold it or cling to it to make it stay. You just softly move your attention close to it. (Often, the best way to do this is not to observe it frontally, but as if you were watching it from the side.) Perhaps you gently breathe into it and let the breath merge your awareness into it. Or you explore it. How does it look? What is its texture? What do you see or hear? You might also try shifting your perspective. Instead of feeling that you are outside this vision, observing it, imagine that you are inside it. With a sound, imagine that you are hearing it all around you. Letting yourself be with an experience allows you to move much deeper into your inner field. Perhaps there is a sensation of expanding awareness, but the expansion stops at a certain point. You can let yourself linger on the edge of that expanded awareness, sensing the subtle texture of the consciousness that is expanding, or you can enter the field of consciousness that stretches within you, unfurling itself to the inner senses. The way to enter it is to become it. It’s not your physical self that becomes the expanded awareness, of course. It’s your mind-sense, your subtle self. You become it by identifying yourself with it. First, you identify yourself as awareness, as attention. (For some people, this may mean quickly going through a process in which you disengage from identifying with your body, perhaps thinking, “I am not my skin, my bones, my blood, or my organs. I am not my senses, my breath, my mind, or my thoughts. I am not my emotions or my sensations. I am Awareness. I am energy.”) Then you move as awareness into this subtle field within yourself, as if you were a snowball picking up more snow as you roll.

When your messaging strategy has the foundation that allows the message to be delivered in an array of ways that best represents your vision while allowing each person to have their own authenticity in sharing it, the reach expands. 

At every moment and in every situation, with every thought and action, ask yourself two questions: Is this the greatest version of the grandest vision I have ever had of myself? What would love do? Then adjust your thoughts and actions based on the answers to these two questions.

Self-Discovery in San Francisco CA | Suzanne Fensin If This looks like what's Driving You, Then you're THE New Human And it slow Has come back To Step Up! The easiest to know your life purpose is thru your journey of self discovery. supported your birthname that holds distinctive sacred codes that unlock your destiny, your Soul Blueprint holds all the answers to what your challenges area unit and also the gifts they reveal, as well as what your skills and gifts area unit at a deeper level, and the way to activate them to make your a lot of fulfilling life. Life Purpose is complicated. throughout my self discovery journey, I uncovered hidden ways and forks within the road. there have been hills, mountains, valleys and shadowy places which will be scary to travel through. i finished and began, unsure if I had the strength to urge through it all. however I did it! and that i wish to share my method with you to jumpstart your magnificence that you’ve been concealing. Soul Codes Blueprint in San Jose CA This is a 12-week personal 1:1 mentoring program ideally delivered via ZOOM. ZOOM recordings of sessions are provided, upon request. Email support is supplied with every step of this method. Here’s what you receive with this distinctive program L – Learning Your distinctive skills, goals, and challenges with Soul Blueprint Reading. this is often a 1-hour, birthname solely analysis that offers you the subsequent information: • Birthname analysis • Your most fulfilling soul expression • Your Soul Destiny for this period of time • Karmic lessons, skills and gifts you were born with, and people you receive later in life. • Emailed Zoom recording of the session, upon request • Special discount rating on future mentoring that helps to activate your blueprint on a deeper level O - OMG you're Amazing! Understanding the scope of your soul mission and the way your skills, goals, and challenges work along to make your greatest purpose. acceptive the sweetness of the journey and speech communication affirmative to following step. this is often AN expanded 2-hour Soul Blueprint reading that offers you all of what you receive within the 1-hour reading, and the following: • Up to two extra names analysis • subject for private Years, Months & Cycles • wherever area unit you within the Ascension method • what's your Soul kind V - Valor Having the spirit to roll up your sleeves and acquire into uncovering, understanding, and material possession go of doubts, beliefs, and learning that show up as shadow aspects, and align together with your higher purpose. caring yourself through the method, permitting a lot of lightweight into your being. during this step you'll receive: • Intuitive work to support you in understanding what you discover on a soul level, and to help in your self-nurturing • Soul Blueprint Upgrade (working together with your etheric team to clear attachments, enhance your gift and talent codes, unleash doubt & worry • Flower Essence Remedy suggestions to help in clearing shadow aspects E - Ease, Excitement, And Energize The seeds of management you have got planted area unit currently development. you're claiming your truth and sharing your authentic magnificence (by visioning and actioning) with a reworking world that reflects and honors your journey. you'll receive the subsequent with this step: • corroborative work with life exercises to observe your new brilliance • Celebration exercises to stay you moving forward on your journey of success with grace. Contact Suzanne With Questions #SelfDiscoveryinSanFranciscoCA Email# suzannefensin@gmail.com

Expand your vision and widen your reasoning

A Typical Description of an NDE (Near Death Experience) I asked Ring to describe for me a typical NDE. He told me: The first thing is a tremendous feeling of peace, like nothing else you have experienced. Most people say like never before and never again. People say [that it is] the peace that passes all understanding. Then there is the sense of bodily separation and sometimes the sense of actually being out of the body. There are studies that show that people can sometimes report veridically what is in their physical environment, e.g., the lint on the light fixtures above themselves. They could see in a three-hundred-sixty-degree panoramic vision. They had extraordinary acuity. Often when they went further into the experience, they went to a dark place that is sometimes described as a tunnel, but not always. They usually feel that there is a sense of motion; that they are moving through something that is vast almost beyond imagination. And yet they feel they don't have the freedom to go anywhere. They feel as if they were being propelled. The extreme sense of motion often seems to be one of acceleration. Some describe that they have felt as if they were moving a the speed of light or faster. One NDEr described this as superluminal-moving beyond the speed of light with tremendous accelerated motion through a kind of cylindrical vortex, and then, in the distance, the person describes a dot of light that suddenly grows larger, more brilliant, and all encompassing. Ring continued: At this stage of the experience there is an encounter with light. It seems to be a living light exuding pure love, complete acceptance, and total understanding. The individual feels that he is made of that light, that he has always been there, and that he has stepped out of time and stepped into eternity. This feeling is accompanied by a sense of absolute perfection. Being out of time introduces another aspect of the experience: a sense of destiny. Ring explained: Then there is a panoramic light review in which you see everything that has ever happened to you in your life. Not [only] just what you have done but the effects of your actions on others, the effects of your thoughts on others. The whole thing is laid out for you without being judged but with a complete understanding of why things were the way they were in your life. The best metaphor I can suggest for this is: as if you were the character in someone else's novel. There would be one moment outside of time where you would have the perspective of the author of that novel, and you have a sense of omniscience about that character. Why he did the things that he did, why he had affected others, and so on. It is a profound moment outside of time when this realization occurs. You see the whole raison d'etre of your life. You may also see scenes or fragments of scenes of your life if you choose to go back to your body. In other words, it is not only that you have flashbacks but you also seem to have flash-forwards of events that will occur almost at though there is a kind of blueprint for your life. And it is up to you at that moment. You have free choice because it is often left to you whether to go back to your life or to leave it behind. The people we talk with of course always make the choice to go back or sometimes are sent back.

The Himalaya (hɪmalɶyɶ) does not make Rishis, the Rishis make the Himalaya (hɪmalɶyɶ) to be what it is. A Rishi is a beacon of light that expands and clarifies the stretches of vision of all those that connect with her/him here and now. It is like taking a candle into a dark room, and everything in the room is visible. As a natural and spontaneous consequence, the door leading to the open light filled outdoors becomes visible to you. You can now naturally and spontaneously step out of the room that you were trapped in due to the darkness of ignorance, and let your consciousness expand into infinity. Stay in the present moment, in the here and now, my brother. Immerse yourself into the present entirely. Then you will see these Rishis in yourSelf, here and now, and always. The infinitely spaced vast reaches of the picturesque multiple dimensions of the present moment, pregnant with all futures, right here right now, becomes your vision.” Krishna, ‘A Iyer in Jose’s Well

Goals are measurable. Goals are things you try to grab or achieve or GET. Intention is bigger in some indefinable but undeniable way. Intention is a calling forth. And it is done with clarity and sometimes even trepidation because you know that in the very setting of the intention, you will be called to become something more expanded than you are now.

If you don’t think past your own thoughts, you will live a prisoner to your experience. And that can be a very small cell to live in.

The most significant factor in natural vision improvement seems to be in the mind, not in the eyes!

Researchers who have studied SMART goals and other structured methods of choosing objectives say this isn’t unusual. Such systems, though useful, can sometimes trigger our need for closure in counterproductive ways. Aims such as SMART goals “can cause [a] person to have tunnel vision, to focus more on expanding effort to get immediate results,” Locke and Latham wrote in 1990. Experiments have shown that people with SMART goals are more likely to seize on the easiest tasks, to become obsessed with finishing projects, and to freeze on priorities once a goal has been set. “You get into this mindset where crossing things off your to-do list becomes more important than asking yourself if you’re doing the right things,” said Latham.

not alone. Even having a single ally is enough to dramatically increase your will to act. Find one person who believes in your vision and begin tackling the problem together. 15. Remember that if you don’t take initiative, the status quo will persist. Consider the four responses to dissatisfaction: exit, voice, persistence, and neglect. Only exit and voice improve your circumstances. Speaking up may be the best route if you have some control over the situation; if not, it may be time to explore options for expanding your influence or leaving.

Expand your vision, enlarge your thinking, and get in the company of people who can expose you to levels that you have never seen.

Don’t underestimate the power of vision and direction. These are irresistible forces, able to transform what might appear to be unconquerable obstacles into traversable pathways and expanding opportunities. Strengthen the individual. Start with yourself. Take care with yourself. Define who you are. Refine your personality. Choose your destination and articulate your Being.

Being a true leader, as opposed to a competent manager, requires a willingness to get your hands dirty. I have said before that I do not expect anyone to do a job I cannot do myself. While this is clearly unrealistic as a company grows and expands, the perception of being willing to step in and assist must remain. The weight of leadership includes staying calm while others panic and coming up with solutions rather than joining the chorus of complaints. The Covid-19 pandemic has certainly helped distinguish the leaders from the managers. Leaders are prepared to take responsibility when things go wrong, even if the true responsibility lies with someone else. Leaders are visible. Leaders have a vision, even if it is only short term. I don’t really believe in long-term planning. I make up the rules of the game based on one-year plans. This means I always retain visibility and control. Five years is too long a time to have any certainty that the objectives will be met. Leadership is not a popularity contest, but it also should not inspire fear. Leaders earn respect and loyalty, recognising that these take a long time to earn and a second to lose. A leader is not scared of collaboration and listening to the opinions of others, as well as accepting help when it’s needed. Leadership is not a quality that you are born with, it is something that you learn over time. I was not a leader in my Coronation days, and I am the first to admit that I made a lot of mistakes. Even at African Harvest, as much as I achieved financial success and tried different techniques to earn respect, I never truly managed to deal with the unruly investment team. But, having built on years of experience, by the time I hit my stride at Sygnia, I was a leader. Within any organisation of substantial size, there is space for more than one leader, whether they head up divisions or the organisation itself. There are several leaders across Sygnia weaving the fabric of our success. I am no longer the sole leader, having passed the baton on to others in pursuit of my own dreams. To quote the Harvard Business Review, ‘The competencies most frequently required for success at the top of any sizable business include strategic orientation, market insight, results orientation, customer impact, collaboration and influence, organisational development, team leadership, and change leadership.’ That is what I looked for in my successor, and that is what I found in David. I am confident that all the leaders I have groomed are more than capable of taking the company forwards.

Real greatness is when you use your own achievements to teach others, and they learn how to teach others, and the greatness that you’ve accomplished expands exponentially. Rather than seeing achievement as status, think of the role you play in other people’s lives as the most valuable currency. When you expand your vision, you realize that even people who have it all derive the greatest satisfaction from service.

Getting the job If you’re looking to land an early PM job at a startup, making a strong impression with your vision for the future of their industry can help you. Shalendra Chhabra (Shalen), now director of marketing at Indix, was able to get hired as an early PM at two different startups by using this approach, despite lacking strong connections to the companies. When he was looking for a new job, he brainstormed a list of startups with a friend. Swype, a company that makes on-screen keyboards for touch devices, was on that list. He was interested in the company and wrote a memo about how he saw the future: touch devices would explode in popularity, and they would want to expand into different languages and add new features such as predictive tap. In the memo, he described how his background and skills would add value to the company. He then was able to get an introduction to someone at the company through a friend of a friend and sent along his memo.

Don’t underestimate the power of vision and direction. These are irresistible forces, able to transform what might appear to be unconquerable obstacles into traversable pathways and expanding opportunities. Strengthen the individual. Start with yourself. Take care with yourself. Define who you are. Refine your personality. Choose your destination and articulate your Being. As the great nineteenth-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche so brilliantly noted, “He whose life has a why can bear almost any how.”61

Once freedom perches in the eye, nothing can stop its wings from budding, fluttering, and pushing off against the winds into the ever expanding sky.

of his travels. I knew something had taken place. Not until weeks later did he tell me about meeting you.” “He senses the presence of a one-time event,” John said. “One of your ‘windows of creativity’ is opening. All the elements are here now. Riverdale Center with its community of brilliant seekers has become the womb for a new vision. We don’t have a name for it yet, but that will come.

the foundation is the words. And you. Think about it: You have never existed in the world of literature before. Your voice, your vision, your unique stamp.

You learn to say no. When you make your goals a top priority, it will mean saying no to things that don’t align with your vision. This is a sign that you have a clear view of where you are heading. Knowing what your real aspirations are will make your journey forward clear, so that you don’t get pulled into distractions.

A personal bioplan can take a form as humble as a pot on the balcony of an urban high-rise. One beneficial plant, a mint for example, releases aerosols that open up your airways. That plant does the same thing for the birds and other small creatures, and for the people you love and keep close. The true goal of the global bioplan is for every person to create and protect the healthiest environment they can for themselves, their families, the birds, insects and wildlife. That personal bioplan then gets stitched to their neighbours’, expanding outward exponentially. If we each start with something as small as an acorn and nurture it into an oak, a master tree that we have grown and protect and are the steward of, if we have that kind of thinking on a mass scale, then the planet is no longer in jeopardy from our greed. We’ve become the guardians of it. It’s a dream of trying to get a better world for every living thing.

Jack Kornfield: I’d like to see the next Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders expanded beyond pathology. The upcoming revision should have a whole section on human potential and highly developed well-being. We should expand our vision, both individually and collectively. What is a wise society and what is a wise individual in a wise society? There are possibilities of profound inner peace, joy, creativity, and freedom—remarkable dimensions of mental health that all our collective work is pointing to. Zindel Segal: To follow up on what Jack said, a lot of the way we identify emotional problems is by considering them as episodes. Something starts, you have a difficult time, then it ends, and you’re back to being who you were. But if you look at the actual trajectory over people’s lives, they have many episodes that start and stop. For some people with depression, they never actually pull out of it completely and continue to have difficulties in a low-grade way. We are now starting to consider these not as episodes but as chronic problems that require different treatments from just fixing an episode. We can encourage people to practice lifelong ways of looking after themselves: mental training, even when they are not symptomatic; lifestyle changes such as exercise, even when they don’t necessarily need to lose weight. These are examples of taking responsibility for one’s own care. Meditation training is a very important part of that, along with other approaches that don’t necessarily need the presence of an illness to be of benefit. Jon Kabat-Zinn: That relates to what Alan was saying about an attitudinal shift. Your whole life can change in relationship to exercise or diet, for example. It’s not like “Now I’m on a diet,” but rather “This is simply the way I eat and the things I choose to nourish myself with,” including the diet of what comes in through your eyes and your ears, through television, through the newspaper, and through your relationships.

Study to acquire knowledge - not just to get a certificate or promotion. Acquisition of knowledge is key to the programming or reprogramming of your mind and expanding your frame of reference. Choose the areas of study in line with your vision and mission as well as your strengths and interests. Make sure you seek opportunities to practice and implement the new information and knowledge you gain from your study.

Life is open to us all. No one will ever see life exactly the same as another. Some folks will argue that one who is on a focused path to expanding into the best they can be has changed or is changing. To that I say: I haven't changed I'm just growing better and more confident about moving towards my vision.. I feel ready. Since I'm ready everything has opened to me. Beyond that, just remember that- No one can see the goal like you can. No one will, ever. But team work still works! People can feel the passion in your movement. Help comes when we free ourselves from fearing success. Call out your dream and move on it. Step by step. Yes, you can. Just keep striving! Much love and honor.

Anxiety does not exist to control you. You exist to control it. It is, as I said, a simple fact of life that can be managed. In fact, used properly, it can actually give you an extra boost by heightening your energy and awareness. If you have social anxiety about such things as giving a presentation, speaking up at a meeting, attending a social gathering, initiating plans, developing intimacy in friendships and dating, then learning to manage your anxiety will help. This book will teach you how to channel your anxiety—not how to eliminate it. The twelve chapters delineate a five-step program that essentially works like this: Step I: Identify your anxiety symptoms and recognize the ways in which they interfere with your life. Your social fears prevent you from doing things you would like to do (pursue friendships, date, achieve career success). Pinpointing your stress responses and noting what causes them give you the information you need to move on to Step 2. Step 2: Set short- and long-term social goals. Having identified the situations you have trouble confronting, you can identify immediate goals to work toward, and start to form a vision of your ideal social self. Goal-setting is a valuable way of letting your imagination offer a reward for your hard work. Next, you will begin to learn skills that can make your dream a reality. Step 3: Learn stress management and self-awareness. The techniques outlined in this book will allow you to control your anxiety response and tune in to your own desires and strong points, giving you more to share as you become more comfortable interacting. With your anxiety in check and your self-awareness guiding you toward fulfillment, anxiety becomes positive energy and will be the base of your self-empowerment. Now you are ready to polish your social skills. Step 4: Learn or refine social skills. Your fear has diminished, making it possible to refine social skills and enhance your interactive productivity, which will make the difference between social success and failure. Good conversation, active listening, an awareness of what behavior is appropriate—all of these skills will add to your overall social ability and self-empowerment. Step 5: Expand and refine your social network. At this point, you are ready to roll. You understand your anxiety, your stress is manageable, and you have learned the finer points of interacting in a positive, productive manner. The final step is to use your community’s resources to create, expand, or refine your social network to best meet your interactive goals. No matter who you are, you can improve your social network to better suit your needs. From here, anything is possible!

A luminous space is a place that is restorative and nurturing. It is a place that emits a light from within. It's a place that feels like home and is secure and safe. It is a place you have affection for. It's playful and inspirational as well as a place where you can breathe and expand your vision. A luminous space is full of vitality and life. A luminous space supports you in achieving your highest goals and igniting your personal power.

Framing. While common sense suggests we should start to plan by defining goals, it also helps to study the lens through which we see problems and solutions. By examining needs, wants, feelings, and beliefs, we’re better able to know and share our vision and values. Imagining. By expanding our awareness of paths and possibilities, we create choice and inform strategy. We search and research for information, then play with models to stray beyond knowledge. Sketches draw insights that help us add options and refine plans. Narrowing. After diverging, it’s critical to converge by prioritizing paths and options. This requires study of drivers, levers, estimates, and consequences, as the value of a strategy is tied to time and risk. Deciding. While decisions are often made in an instant, the process of committing to and communicating a course of action merits time and attention. Instructions are essential to the rendering of intent. Words matter. So do numbers. Define metrics for success carefully. Executing. The dichotomy between planning and doing is false. In all sorts of contexts, we plan as we travel, build, or get things done. Reflecting. While it helps to ask questions throughout the process, we should also make space to look back at the whole from the end. Long before the invention of time, people used the North Star to find their way in the dark. In the future, I hope you will use these principles and practices to make your way in the world. Figure 1-10. Principles and practices of planning.

Are you brave enough to expand your nocturnal activities, and work with a partner?" "It depends." His smile faltered. "On what?" "On how close of a partnership you're talking about." He pulled her towards him. Wrapping his arms around her, he kissed her. "Is this close enough?" Instead of answering, she led him to her dark bedroom. "You can get closer. How's your night vision?" Mitch grinned. "Excellent." Night Vision

REACHING GAMES To encourage your baby to reach and to expand her horizons, try holding attractive toys just out of her reach: above her head, in front of her, to the sides. See how close you have to get the toy before she makes her move. Remember, the object here is not to tease or torture the baby, it’s to have fun. You can add another layer of complexity by putting the out-of-reach object on a blanket or towel. Then slowly pull the blanket and show her how it gets closer. Will she try that herself? TOUCHING GAMES Try this: let your baby play with a small toy without letting her see it (you could do this in the dark or with her hands in a paper bag). Then put that toy together with several other toys she’s never played with. Many babies this age will pick up the familiar toy. Although this may sound fairly easy, it isn’t. You’re asking your baby to use two senses—touch and vision—at the same time, and to recognize by sight something she’s touched but not seen. If your baby isn’t ready for this one, don’t worry. Just try it again in a few weeks. It’s a concept that can take a while to develop. IF … THEN … GAMES There are thousands of things you can do to reinforce cause-and-effect thinking. Rattles, banging games, rolling a ball back and forth, and splashing in the pool are excellent. So is blowing up your cheeks and having the baby “pop” them with her hands. Baby gyms—especially the kind that make a lot of noise when smacked—are also good, but be sure to pack them up the moment your baby starts trying to use the gym to pull herself up; they’re meant to be used while sitting or lying down and aren’t sturdy enough to support much weight. OBJECT PERMANENCE GAMES When your baby is about six or seven months old, the all-important idea that objects can exist even when they’re out of sight finally starts sinking in. • Object permanence develops in stages. If you’re interested in seeing how, try this: Show your baby a toy. Then, while she’s watching, “hide” it under a pillow. If you ask her where the toy is, she’ll probably push the pillow out of the way and “find” it. But if you quickly move the toy to another hiding place when she’s not looking, she’ll continue to look for it in the first hiding place. • Peek-a-boo and other games that involve hiding and finding things are great for developing object permanence. Peek-a-boo in particular teaches your baby an excellent lesson: when you go away, you always come back. This doesn’t sound like much, but making this connection now lets her know she can count on you to be there when she needs you and will help her better cope with separation anxiety (see page 222).

Your vision should be ever-growing. There will come a time where you meet many of your goals. What you thought was out of reach yesterday, became a reality in the present. When this happens expand your thinking and set your vision even farther out. You should be actively chasing your vision.