7 Crucial Steps to Creating Inner Peace

Would you like to have more inner peace in 2015? Below are 7 powerful steps to getting there.

1. Take care of unfinished business
   Un-kept promises, uncompleted projects, stacks of papers and unused objects keep you heavy with a burden of “shoulds” on your shoulders. Stop living with this subtle, underlying feeling of guilt. Watch what you take on and say “yes” to. Either do it or dump it.
2. Allow yourself to be vulnerable and feel your emotions
   It’s okay to ask for help. It’s healthy to cry when you’re sad. Take a risk and open your heart and fall deeply in love. Vulnerability is a strength. If this seems difficult for you, ask, “What am I afraid of?”
3. Become intimate with your fears so you can dismantle them
   You think if you stuff them or slap on a happy face they’ll go away, but it doesn’t work that way. Your fears are an underlying energy inside you that lowers your overall resonance, taking you farther away from feeling good. Instead of denying, distracting or defending your fears, honestly look at them with compassion and curiosity so you can heal them.
4. Stop reading and watching negative information
   If it brings you down, turn it off. You’ll learn everything you need to know without tuning into the drama of media, I promise. What are you choosing to take in and how does it make you feel?
5. Let go of drama
   Do you overreact? Are you in unhealthy relationships? Do you get pulled into other people’s stories or lives? Do you believe you have to struggle to get what you want? Do you love to gossip? Do you feel responsible for the happiness of others? Let it go.
6. Forgive yourself and others for the past.
   The past is over. Resentment will never bring you happiness. Let it go and move on. Be present to what is today. The choice is yours. You can continue to hold onto the constricting tightness of resentment, blame and anger or release it and find inner peace.
7. Stop worrying
   Worrying only propels you to spiral downward. It creates drama. Take care of what you can take care of now and let the rest go. Remember, what you give attention will expand. See where you want to go, not where you don’t want to go.

For most of us, many of the above are habits. The first, most powerful step to changing a habit is to recognize you do this and acknowledge the impact it’s having on your life.  Slow things down enough to notice.

Which of the above are you ready to recognize, acknowledge and release to have more inner peace in 2013?

What do you do to create inner peace? What keeps you from feeling peaceful? I invite you to share your thoughts with me below.