Question: Having to rush is punishing… is it also a sure sign that I’m “asleep”? How does rushing overtake me so easily? What can I do to deliberately slow down when the urge to hurry seems overwhelming?

Answer: Every person knows what it feels like to be carried off by an anxious state, so you decide: when some anxiety comes along and takes over your life — are you an awake inwardly centered person — or are you an unconscious outwardly driven man or woman? Which are you? That you’re outwardly directed is pretty obvious. Why? Because that anxious state could not exist without your false belief that who you are — your well-being — is connected to something happening exterior to yourself. And now this mistaken idea is driving you, compelling you to get this thing fixed or that situation resolved right now, because once you have, you’ll be back in a peaceful place. As long as you take yourself as someone who has something to lose because of your identification with any temporary exterior condition or circumstance, you will remain someone subject to every outer condition.

By deliberately slowing yourself down when everything in you seems to be screaming “Rush,” you will become inwardly awake. You’ll become conscious of yourself in a new way. For the first time you’ll understand that these anxiety attacks have nothing to do with what didn’t get done, or with what “might happen,” but that their painful place dwells within a belief-packed self you’re living from that’s convinced if you don’t answer the situation it says has caused your anxiety, you’ll end up losing something valuable. This new kind of prayer-in-action changes your perception of yourself by turning your attention around to where the real problem, and the real solution, exists: within you. This simple but powerful prayer will help you make the transforming transition to find your life inside of you instead of forever looking for a way to fix it by struggling outside of you.