Personal Transformation-Two Perspectives

Two Perspectives on Personal Transformation¹

Two perspectives’ is a monthly column with two different perspectives from two different continents, genders and cultures on the same topic viz.

Dr Janet Smith Warfield, Florida, USA &
Dr Amit Nagpal, India

^{Dr Janet Smith Warfield's Perspective}

What is personal transformation, and why would we want to experience it?

Personal transformation is like looking at an optical illusion. The lines, shapes, and colors on the paper don’t change. What changes is how our minds shape what is on the paper, the words we use to describe what we see, how we feel about what we see, and the actions we take as a result.

The real world is the same way. Nothing out there changes.² What changes is the way our minds shape what is out there. Personal transformation is suddenly seeing the world through new eyes.

Do we want to see a man’s face or do we want to see the word “Liar?” Which makes us feel better? Which makes our relationships work more smoothly?

When personal transformation happens, we are suddenly free. We realize we can choose in each and every moment the perspectives, words, and actions that bring us the greatest peace and happiness.

If we desire to experience personal transformation, how do we bring it into our lives? With the optical illusion, we can’t force ourselves to see the word “Liar” if we only see a man’s face. We can’t force ourselves to see a man’s face if we only see the word “Liar.”

Likewise, we can’t force ourselves to experience personal transformation. We can only commit to using tools and practices which support shifts in perception through sudden moments of clarity. We pick a tool from the cornucopia of possibilities, try it out, and observe how it works. If we don’t like one tool, we try another until we find one we like.

Experiencing personal transformation in the real world is much more challenging than seeing the different perspectives of an optical illusion. In the real world, the perspectives we cling to are usually charged with emotion such as guilt, fear, rage, despair, or pride. If we are suffering from the shock of a spouse’s betrayal, how can we transform betrayal into trust? If we are suffering from the death of a child, how can we transform grief into life purpose and meaning?

Personal transformation in the real world is also challenging because we cling to conditioned beliefs we’ve been taught as children. Usually, we’re not even aware that our beliefs are conditioned. They may have been such wonderful guidelines that we honor them as Truth. The fact is that wonderful guidelines are never Truth. They are only tools that work in many situations for particular purposes.

Here are some time-tested tools and practices to help us go deep within, shift perspectives and see through new eyes:

1. Journaling
2. Meditation
3. Vision boards
4. Ropes courses
5. Labyrinths
6. Forgiveness
7. Gratitude
8. Mantras
9. Drumming
10. Toning
11. Crystal bowls
12. Focusing on the breath, e.g., soham breathing
13. Heart resonance
14. Yoga
15. Martial arts

The list keeps growing as our awareness and creativity expand and we shift into greater and greater abundance.

Amit and I will be exploring each tool and practice in depth in subsequent blogs.

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1. Personal Transformation is only one aspect of transformation. Other aspects are marital transformation, family transformation, community transformation, world transformation, and more.

2. Since I am writing with the intention of clarifying personal transformation, I am stating that nothing out there changes. If I were writing with the intention of clarifying intention, I would be stating that what is out there does change depending on the intentions we set.

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Dr. Janet Smith Warfield serves wisdom-seekers who want understanding and clarity so they can live peaceful, powerful, prosperous lives. Through her unique combination of holistic, creative, right-brain transformational experiences and 22 years of rigorous, left-brain law practice, she has learned how to sculpt words in atypical ways to shift her listeners into experiences beyond words, transforming turmoil into inner peace. For more information, see www.wordsculptures.com, www.janetsmithwarfield.com, and www.wordsculpturespublishing.com

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Dr Amit Nagpal's Perspective

Transformation-Why, When and How

Transform simply means to change our appearance or character (usually) for the better. Sometimes we do change for the worse also because of emotional baggage and negative experiences.

Why Transform

Life is a journey and each step in the journey is towards the final destination of finding perfect peace and happiness (enlightenment or something similar). The soul learns its lessons through experiences, mistakes and conscious efforts to grow.

Experiences and mistakes may teach us and transform us for the better but we can learn faster (and with lesser mistakes and pain) by taking conscious efforts for our transformation. Transformation implies inner transformation, which impacts our external behavior though.

When to Transform

Only one thing is constant in this world and that is change. Transformation also becomes necessary to adapt to the external changes (adaptability) but it tends to be reactive. We can rather go for proactive change.

How to Transform

Here is a sequence of steps which can be undertaken for self-transformation:-

1. Make a list of your areas of improvement (weaknesses or strengths to be further improved)
2. Prioritise
3. Set goals
4. Choose tools and take action
5. Monitor progress
6. Take corrective action, if required (or revise goals)

A famous saying goes;

“No matter how good intentions we may have, the world looks only at our presentations.

No matter how good presentations we may have, God looks at only our intentions.”

To fit into the world (by the way, you need to decide how much you want to fit in), we need to package ourselves and manage our image/impression. But to find peace or to connect with higher consciousness/power, we must work on improving our intentions, making them more and more pure. Gratitude and positive interpretation of events are some of the tools which help us in purifying our intent.

I had once posted on Facebook,

“When you become a little more mindful,

You become a little more soulful.

When you become a little more soulful,

You become a little more mindful.

Little by little, the journey must go on.”

It will very often happen that when you will take two steps forward, life will push you one step backward. There will be times, you will be too depressed. It is believed that every human being seriously contemplates suicide at least once in life; we all go through extremely trying times or acid tests of life. But life is like a stress interview and if we make up our mind that we are not going to be stressed, no matter what, one day we find the perfect peace.

Just remember, even if life has slapped you hard, you must get up and carry on the inner transformation, because the trouble of today is the joke of tomorrow.

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Dr Amit Nagpal is a Personal Branding Consultant & Deepest Passion Coach. He is based in New Delhi, India and specializes in personal branding with a holistic touch. His philosophy is, "Enlarge as a Human Being, Excel as a Social Media Being and Evolve as a Personal Brand"