Start with the premise that alignment is always available

What’s guiding me when it comes to alignment these days is two-fold.

First, say yes to what’s in alignment, and say no to what’s not.

Sounds pretty simple, right?

I think of this guideline as being a gatekeeper of sorts when it comes to alignment. If from the get-go I make decisions through the lens of alignment, there will be a lot less that ends up in my life experience that is misaligned.

Here’s a recent example from my life.

A wonderful client of mine is starting her own podcast. I’m sure it’s going to be fantastic, and wish her so much joy on her journey of creating her show. She extended a warm invitation to have me on the show as a guest. I would talk about Law of Attraction as well as my coaching services and the courses I offer. It was a lovely invitation.

When I checked in with myself for my aligned answer, it was an easy no thank you. My intuitive, aligned answer was no.

That’s an example of making a decision through the lens of alignment. Rather than through the filter of pleasing others, or what would be “good for my business”, or what others are doing, etc. Making a decision through the lens of alignment is also not getting out a piece of paper to brainstorm pros and cons to figure out should I or I should I not?

Alignment is the beautiful intersection of what feels good and what I want to do.

Now here’s the thing, if I had said yes to the podcast guest invitation, I could most certainly have gotten into alignment with that action. I could have aligned my thoughts so that I felt positive emotion as I prepared for being on the show and then actually appeared on the show.

Meaning, I could have chosen thoughts that felt good to me about the experience. I could have reached for better-feeling or good-feeling thoughts throughout and aligned with being a guest on the show.

But since the original decision was not in alignment, I would need to do some work to be in alignment with what unfolded. This is an important point: I could have gotten in alignment with being on the show, but would have needed to do thought work to get there.

I would have expended energy to reach for thoughts about the experience so I could feel good, so I could be in alignment.

Now, this would certainly not be an impossible task. Or even a particularly Herculean effort. But it would be an effort, nonetheless.

Ideally, I would prefer not to expend my energy aligning with decisions that I wasn’t aligned with in the first place.

What about you? Is that how you want to use your energy—working to get in alignment with things you said yes to even as you wanted to say no, or vice versa?

This is about saying yes to things that are in alignment for you. And it’s also about staying in alignment with your nos.

Here’s what I mean. Let’s say you say no to hosting the family gathering or no to the volunteer commitment. At the time you said no, you were in alignment with your decision. Then your thoughts begin the shift from alignment to misalignment.

I often hear someone say they were in alignment with their initial decision, but then second guessing or factoring in the opinions—real or imagined—of others, lead them into misalignment.

These thoughts could be in the form of a should. Maybe I should have said yes. These thoughts could be ones that cause you to feel guilt. Your sister-in-law questions your decision, you start to second-guess, and feel guilty about saying no.

• Say yes to hosting the family gathering because it’s in alignment for you and stay in alignment with your yes.
• Say no to hosting the family gathering because it’s not in alignment for you and stay in alignment with your no.

Staying in alignment with your yeses and nos is about choosing to think thoughts that support and align with your decisions.

This first guideline—say yes to what’s in alignment, say no to what’s not—truly is a gatekeeper that keeps out the need for spending energy trying to align with things you didn’t want to do in the first place.

This brings me to the second guideline: Get in alignment with whatever you are doing.

In my example, if I’d said yes to the guest appearance, even though it would not have been an aligned yes, I could have gotten in alignment.

If you’ve got stuff on your To Do list and calendar that you would rather have said no to, this isn’t about throwing up your hands and just accepting being misaligned. No matter the situation or task, the commitment or obligation, alignment is possible.

This is because alignment isn’t dependent upon the circumstance or situation; alignment is coming from your thoughts.

It is your thoughts that cause your feelings. It is your thoughts about the situation that cause you to feel positive emotion or negative emotion, alignment or misalignment.

“If you deliberately bring yourself into alignment, circumstances go well for you. It’s all based on what you are doing with your vibration.” —Abraham

Bottom line: You can choose thoughts that take you in the direction of alignment about whatever it is that you’re doing or that’s going on around you.

Regardless of your original yes or no, and whether your answer or decision was originally in alignment, you can choose thoughts that get you in alignment with what’s going on.

One of the examples I often use to illustrated this is my taxes. From my earliest days as an entrepreneur, I was in a state of misalignment about my taxes.

What I mean by that is the action of prepping any and all tax-related paperwork and preparing for meeting with my accountant was just absolutely fraught with friction. I procrastinated and felt guilty. I was frustrated with myself.

Year after year I would promise myself to do it differently and then feel disappointed in myself for it always being pretty much the same bogged down, irritating, low vibe experience.

Now, let’s keep in mind I could have just made the decision to outsource every aspect and action related to my taxes and been in alignment that way. But that’s not the decision I made, year after year.

Instead, I made the decision to say yes to prepping things myself and then was totally misaligned with actually carrying out that decision. All my action and inaction was from the energy of misalignment.

This clearly was my opportunity for living the second guideline: Get in alignment with whatever you are doing.

Nothing has changed about what’s externally required to successfully do my taxes. But what has changed is my commitment to alignment.

I am simply no longer willing to do something mired in misalignment.

Which means managing my mind and doing the thought work necessarily to align with the decision I’ve made to do the prep work for my taxes.

If you’ve always loved doing your taxes or have always happily turned this over to someone else, don’t get too caught up in the specific example. This is not really about taxes at all.

It’s about alignment. It’s about me saying yes to doing this tax prep and then aligning with that yes by thinking thoughts that allow me to feel good before, during, and after the entire experience.

In fact, I recently had this experience of pulling together all the various documentation and data for my personal and business taxes. Here are the emotions I experienced throughout: Empowerment, appreciation, positive expectation. In other words, it was a high vibe experience.

What’s super revealing about that example is nothing is different externally from when I hated doing my taxes to how I feel today. Nothing external is different. Same math, same documents.

But what is fundamentally and drastically different is what’s going on internally. My internal world has changed so my outer experience is different.

What’s different is the thoughts I think on purpose. What’s difference in my commitment to be in alignment. What’s different is choosing thoughts that allow me to feel good during the experience.

That is an example of getting in alignment with whatever I’m doing, including my taxes.

What if you were to start with the premise that alignment is always available?

This doesn’t mean you will always be in alignment. But if you start with the belief alignment is always available, then it’s simply a matter of heading in that direction.

“It’s not about action…it’s about vibrational alignment.” —Abraham

It’s not about whether you say yes to baking cookies for the bake sale or you say no. The action of baking the cookies or the inaction of not baking the cookies is not what matters.

What matters is your vibrational alignment.

Be aligned with the decisions you make and the actions you take. Because then you feel good, which is wonderful in and of itself. And, Law of Attraction responds to your good feeling, delivering a life experience that matches your vibrational alignment.

• Are you saying yes to what’s in alignment, and no to what’s not?
• Are you getting in alignment for whatever you are doing?