Do you ever...

• not know what to believe?

• feel unsure about how to respond to false ideas?

• take on the negative energy of other people?

• get burntout trying to too many good things?

• alienate people when you're trying to help them?

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This world is full of voices. The voices can come from friends, family, media outlets, society, and all sorts of other sources. They can even come from within oneself.

 

It can be hard to know which voices to believe and how to respond to them. The ten core principles of this season can help you do just that. As you review them, you'll read the word "influence" a lot. By influence, we mean any person or information that attempts to get you to believe or act a certain way.

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1. Resonate with Goodness:​

As you act in ways that are virtuous, you're ability to discern truth will naturally grow. The very vibration of your soul will raise to a higher frequency and then, when you encounter an influence, you'll find yourself intuitively knowing if it resonates at a virtuous frequency as well and it will very clear to you when an influence is of some other, less virtuous frequency. You'll just naturally know when something is true and helpful and when it is not.

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In addition, your frequency will attract influences into your life that match your frequency. So, if you are frustrated that you keep finding yourself dealing with people who treat you a certain way, it is very likely that you are doing that very thing to others. Like is attracting like. If you want to attract more people with certain virtues, live those virtues yourself.

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> What patterns do you notice in the kinds of people that show up in your life over and over? If you're really honest with yourself, in what ways do you do the very things those people tend to do?

> Think of behavior that bugs you the most in other people? In what ways do you do that very behavior to yourself and others?

> What can of person would you like to have show up in your life? How can you be that kind of person?

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As you practice resonating with goodness, you'll naturally start discerning which influences are helpful or unhelpful and attracting the helpful ones. It's going to be awesome.

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As you do so, it will be helpful to intentionaly use the next principles as part of that process. These principles are also represented in this flowchart.

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2. Assess the Influence:​

Ask yourself about the influence's intent and effect. Figuring out what the influence's motives are and in what ways it will affect you will help you decide whether or not the influence is helpful to your journey or not.

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> Consider a person who has the potential to influence you. Given all that you know, what do you believe this person's motive is? How does considering their motive affect how you will let them influence you?

> Continue considering this same person. If you let them influence you, will that help you fulfill your yearnity? If you aren't sure, try using this meditation to explore how choosing to accept their influence will affect you.

> What do you think is best to do if someone has selfish or evil motivations but what their telling you to do will still have a positive influence?

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3. Filter Mixed Influences:​

Many influences, maybe even most influences, are a mixture of helpful and unhelpful, true and false. Most things in this world are that way. But you can filter out the helpful and unhelpful portions of the influence and respond to each separately.

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> What's an example of a mixed influence? What are the helpful parts of this influence? What are the unhelpful parts?

> Think of someone or something which you have judged as purely good or purely bad? Choose to be open minded. Is there a mixed aspect to this influence?

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4. Strategize a Reaction:​

Once you've identified if the influence is helpful or unhlepful, you're ready to strategize a reaction. Or, in the case of a mixed influence, you can strategize reactions to each of the different parts of the influence.

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To strategize a reaction, read over the different options below. The first two are possible reactions to a helpful influence and the rest are intented for negative influences.

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As you resonate with goodness, listen to your intuition, and practice responding to influences with different strategize, you'll get better and better and figuring out which ones get the best results in different contexts.

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> Consider an influence in your life now. After assessing and filtering it, read over the possible strategies below. Which one do you want to try using to respond to this influence? Why?

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5. Assert a Positive Influence:​

Actively work to comply with and promote the helpful influence.

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For example, if the influence says to tell the truth, you tell the truth and you might encourage others to do likewise.

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6. Divert a Positive Influence:​

Just because an influence is positive, doesn't men it is something that is best for you at this time and place. Sometimes it is best to divert a positive influence by recognizing it has good intents and effects, filing that away for later, and not acting on it right now.

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If the influence says to help the homeless in another country, you might say, "That sure is important but it fulfills my yearnity to help my family right now."

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The word "divert" implies that 

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7. Reject a Negative Influence:​

Take a zero-tolerance stance against the negative influence. In this case, you’ll likely tell the influence itself that it is negative and tell other people the same. When you reject an influence, you’re doing all you can to stop it.

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If the influence says to lie to your mom, you say, “Lying is wrong. I’m not going to do that” and you might remind the dude next to you that cheating isn’t OK.

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Rejection is a great response to negative influences in many situations. There are times; however, when it can have a couple of disadvantages: (1) it can come off as self-righteous; and (2) it can lead to hyper-focusing on the negative influence which can actual give that influence power over you.

Times when either of this disadvanges come into play are examples of times when it is good to use one of the other three reactions to negative influences.

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8. Distract from a Negative Influence:​

Avoid the influence by simply focusing on something else which is positive or neutral. Pretend the negative influence isn’t there.

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If the influence says to lie, you say, “Look at Kevin over there. He sure is a cool guy.”

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9. Recast a Negative Influence:​

Turn a negative influence into a positive one. Then, you can either Assert or Divert the resulting Positive Influence.

 

One way to Recast a Negative Influence is to apply what it wants you do to a different context.

 

When the influence says to lie, you say, “Lying to protect a victim from their abuser is a good idea”. If there are victims needed protecting right now, you can assert that. Or, you can divert it for later.

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10. Express a Negative Influence (or Its Opposite):​

In some situations, it can be helpful to express a negative influence (in a safe and intentional way) in order to get it out of your system. This is related to expressing emotions intentionally. Some emotions could lead be a negative influence if directed toward another but if you express them in a safe way, they're processed and an undesirable situation is avoided.

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Sometimes, if you're with someone else who is feeling big emotions that could have a negative influence on a situation, it can be helpful to express their emotional tone with your voice (while staying level-headed yourself) in order to help them feel validated and then move onto a more productive emotional state.

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In other situations, you might identify the positive alternative to the negative influence that is being presented to you and exoress that. Doing the opposite of the negative influence is a powerful way to drown out the negative and make sure that it has no power over you.

 

If the influence says to lie, you say, “I’m going to be extra honest today” and follow through on that.