How can you know you are going in the direction of your authentic purpose? This is a question that seriously concerns every one of us. Being able to answer it, and to move in the direction of your purpose, is the key to your happiness and sense of fulfillment. Fortunately, your life actually gives you specific signals to guide you toward your purpose, and to tell you whether you are on or off track. Allow me to explain.

At any given point in your life, you are in transition, seeking to move from what you have already become to a deeper or higher level of being. The external and internal achievements of yesterday do not satisfy you today, although they are important because they form the foundation for your next steps. You are always on the road.

You may have an idea of what road is the road for you, and you may be right. But you may also be wrong. Why? Because where you need to go is still an unknown to you. As the great American psychologist/philosopher William James pointed out, it is your unconscious higher self that knows where you need to go. Your conscious mind, being based in the past, tends to get in the way. It projects the future on the basis of the past, and the past is exactly what you have to release in order to grow!

How many times have you thought you were going after what you wanted, and when you got it, found out it was all wrong? How many times have crises befallen you that you later look back on and see as blessings in disguise? These types of experience tell us that a higher wisdom, and not our conscious minds, is directing our purpose. We need to learn to listen to our higher wisdom in order to follow our life purpose.

How do you learn to listen to your higher wisdom? Among other things, by learning to recognize the signals that something needs to change. Generally, these signals involve discomfort because a part of us resists change. The discomfort can be emotional or physical.

Emotional discomfort takes the form of negative emotions : fear, anger, envy, resentment, jealousy, etc. When you feel such feelings frequently, they signal that you need to let go of something in order to take the next step in your growth. We move forward by letting go of what doesn't work, so as to open the space for new types of experience that are as yet unformed. Our path into the future proceeds by an undoing of the past, it involves indirect rather than direct learning, opening up by letting go.

When you habitually experience negative emotions, what you need to let go of may be internal or external . Internal things that keep us from our purpose include such psychological habits as blaming, resenting others, criticizing or complaining. External things involve our environment. For example, if you feel angry or resentful in a work situation, you may need to let go of that job, even though it might terrify you to do so. Alternatively, you may need to speak up for yourself. The point is, you need to change the structures in which you participate because they are keeping you stuck in negative emotions.

When we chronically suffer from negative emotions, we are failing to listen to the message. We are afraid to let go and move on, whether that involves letting go of our own limiting mental and emotional patterns, or letting go of limiting structures in our environment. When we are afraid to let go, we suffer.

Just as our negative emotions signal the need for change, the body also gives us signals, in the form of illness or pain. These are not there to punish you, but to guide you toward a higher purpose, to teach you something that you might not learn otherwise, something that is frequently involved with learning to care for yourself (and therefore ultimately for the world) more deeply. Learning to genuinely care for yourself, for the divinity that you are within and the gifts that divinity brings to the world, is a hard lesson for all of us to learn.

Negative emotions and physical distress are nothing to be ashamed of. They are a part of all of our lives, they express our growing pains. The challenge is, to know what the problem is that you are being asked to address, and how to address it. Alas, what we think is the problem (our conscious mind at work!) rarely is the real problem! That is where I hope to be able to help you.

Some of you know that many years ago I became 'medically intuitive.' Medical intuition is a form of psychic ability, an ability to read, at a distance, currently core issues underlying a person's physical, emotional or spiritual health. In my own case, this skill developed as a result of serious work healing from chronic illness, years of meditative practice, a commitment I made to trust information that came to me intuitively even if it defied common sense, and a commitment to helping others help themselves. Medical intuition is not woo-woo (though some disreputable people may stain its reputation by claiming to practice it). In fact, it is a natural skill we all have. However, since most people don't understand the nature of the mind, and we live in a mentally repressive culture, most of us don't know how easily we can use our minds like radio transmitters, to project and receive information. Be that as it may, I am here to offer you help in taking the next step of your journey. My job is to help you help yourself, by helping you to see your own core issues more clearly. Once you do see them, you will be wondering how you failed to see them earlier!