The Six Inspirations

by Laura Szmuch 

Brief introduction

There is something I have been interested to learn and investigate since I was very young: What is it that some people do to live to an old age, healthy in mind and body? How can some people make the best of a bad situation? How do they honour every single instant of their lives? Some people enjoy and give the best of themselves in their jobs, are very well-paid, and have abundance of everything , which enables them to do and be what they most desire.

When I trained in NLP[i] almost two decades ago, I learnt a methodology of detailed observation of the subjective experience and behaviour of people who do things very well, in order to learn from them. As an NLP Practitioner, as well as many other things that I studied and developed, I spent the last few years modelling those who seemed to live in a different reality, those people who in spite of any external situation which was apparently negative, kept the brightness in their eyes, and the smile on their faces. Those people who radiated a fabulous inner peace, and simply by being near them, in person or through recordings, videos or their writings, I started to feel wonderfully well, almost magically. 

As we NLP Practitioners do, I started to pay attention to the way they speak, their language, their vision of the world. Some people speak about “inner work”. However, this was not work for me. At least not if we understand work as something arduous, hard or full of sacrifice. We can choose how to do things, and my choice was to have fun. I discovered that in this process of expansion, explanations, interpretations and intellectualizations are very interesting, but they are not enough to fully comprehend the dimension of what I was investigating. This process of transformation has been a real adventure. To fully understand that we are the ones who create our reality was one of my most important discoveries.  

As you read this you may mumble: “But of course I know about this. I have read about it, I have even talked about it”. Of course. Many of us spend years of our lives speaking and reading about “this”. However, the great and wonderful challenge is simply to LIVE IT; to dive into the flow of life, a deeper consciousness, and expansion that never ends. I learnt so many things that sometimes I am overwhelmed by my own energy, and I need to share it with those who are willing to do it. Yes, only with those who choose to, as we are all free to decide how, when, and with whom we do what we do. Some people flow and are creative through sport, others through art in all its expressions, others educating, raising children, cooking, doing business, dancing, helping others, sharing intimacy with their loving partners, travelling, teaching, writing… People  who feel alive, satisfied and full with what they do, are already living the life of their dreams.  They are already flowing and there is nothing else they could learn, because they are already there, which is here, in fact, isn’t it? 

There’s no here or there, and that dichotomy in thought is, precisely, one of the biggest mistakes we make. We tend to believe that when we manage to get there we are going to be happy, wonderful, brilliant. Only there will we have the desired inner peace, and everything we can imagine. There does not exist, and that is one of the most powerful “ahas” that we can have. There is here, right now. What are we waiting for? Why are we postponing it?

Almost five years ago, some months before I turned 40, I jokingly wrote as my msn Nick (name): “Life starts at 40”. Andrés, a friend of mine, answered to me through his own Nick: “Life is today”. I thought he was being really wise at that moment, and his message showed me how limited I had been when I wrote my own message, even if I was being ironic.  Was I saying I had to wait for a few months to start to derive pleasure in life? Ridiculous. The striking thing about this is that Andres left his physical dimension some months after this exchange. He didn’t know he was ill when he left me this gift, and since the day of his departure, I have adopted not only his Nick but his message as a way of life. I engraved it in my bones and in my muscles, in the full awareness of the NOW.

‌

 I can write about what I think and feel, or about the experience of people I know, but the real important thing is one’s own experience. When we read we open our minds, we toy with new ideas, we even say: “I already knew about that”. What exactly is knowing? Another question without an answer, even though I have heard many attempts to define it. What I believe is that one thing is to have heard or thought about something, or even have discussed an idea, and something completely different is to have had a definite experience.

Intellectual knowledge is excellent, but it is not enough in order to live an inspired life. Paradoxically, what people tend to take for granted is that because they have done some reading, they know or understand. And they also assume that a little bit of experience is enough. What I don’t understand is why, when something makes us feel very well, we don’t continue doing it. We leave the possibility to go deeper later, at some time in the future. Undoubtedly, we are all different and there are many ways to do things. In my courses and projects some people dive into the experience, do while they read, participate, and are patient when they become uncomfortable with what they are learning. There are also those who open a folder in their computer, copy and paste the material and leave everything to read in the future, when they feel ready or when they have more time.  It is as if we lived in the illusion that we can always count on a certain moment in the future when we will give ourselves permission to be who we want to be. Meanwhile, we keep complicating things, and being mean with ourselves.

We know that in some other place we can find the best air our lungs can breathe, however, we insist on living in a stuffy unventilated room. Although we keep promising ourselves that one day we will go out, we persist in using artificial scents to create the sensation that the air is pure and breathable just as it is. We spend years like this, leaving everything for later, in the false illusion that the future will bring something better. What is that something better that we keep expecting? We don’t know, but we wait. Hope is a wonderful value, as long as we don’t stay there forever… Sadly, sometimes we don’t even wait, that is, we no longer wait.

There are moments in which we don’t do things, or we find them very hard, simply because we are not ready yet, and it is better to take our time. For example,  I have always wanted to write this book, and I prepared different drafts. However, I had consciously decided that I wanted to wait until I could sit in front of my computer screen and feel that my ideas flowed and were clean and transparent. I wanted it to “sprout” from me… I didn’t want to force anything, I wished for my hands to be a bridge between my soul and the keyboard. In this case, I don’t think I have postponed needlessly. It was clearly a connection with myself to flow with what I write. It is important to see the difference between composing excuses and waiting until we are ready.

While I was giving life to The Six Inspirations I entered a state of flow. My fingers slid on the keyboard softly and energetically at the same time. It was as if it was not the Laura who lives everyday life who was writing, but a wiser version of myself. When we force things that are not ready, they are only being done by a small part of ourselves, a part who is scared and is stubborn. When things come out easily, and everything seems to align so that they work fluently, the “one” who knows has taken the reins of what we are doing. Personally, I am learning to allow the wise part in me to be in charge most of the time.  It’s the one that shines, that has positive energy, the one who is more present and aware, the one who knows from inside her bones.  

My invitation is to learn together how to live an inspired life through the six inspirations that are the heart of my book. Each of the inspirations is a summary of what I have learnt and modelled from people who are happy, wise, and enjoy life; every single moment of their lives, even if they are not perfect. 

First inspiration: Life is today

Second inspiration: My smile

Third inspiration: The one who knows (or the wise part in me)

Fourth inspiration: A life with harmony

Fifth inspiration: My “Ganas”[ii] (a section on goal-setting)

Sixth inspiration: Abundance

And…..the foundation of all of them: GRATITUDE