Got Questions? Create Your Own Council

create your own council
Sometimes in life, you feel kind of lost and could use some good advice from someone who has your highest good in mind.  You might be lucky enough to have a few good friends or relatives you can turn to.  If you’re religious, you might believe that you’ll get an answer through prayer.  If not, here are some ideas on how to get help and guidance for those times when you could really use some good advice.
Create your own wisdom council to get the answers, support, and advice you need to solve life's problems.

1. Create Your Own Wisdom Council

I haven’t been one of the fortunate ones who has friends or relatives to go to when life throws me a curveball and I really need useful constructive advice, so I sat down and created my own Wisdom Council. I think everyone should do this, even if you have people in your life you can go to for support and counsel. The idea here is to gather your own group of trusted advisors. They can be living or deceased. They can be someone you know or someone you’ve only read about or know of through any of the media outlets. It can include world leaders, authors who have touched you in some way, celebrities, ordinary people you read about online or in a newspaper or magazine who inspire you in some way. They can even be real or imaginary. They can include religious figures or angels. Basically, any being who you feel could help you with their wisdom, experience, love, or knowledge is a potential candidate. mentorsIf you choose someone from history or from a religious context, rake the time to really get to know them. Read biographies or autobiographies. Read what people who knew them had to say about them. Look up all the quotes from them you can find. You can get to know people who died before you were born or who you’ve never met personally. There is no limit to the number of people to include in your Wisdom Council. I have 15. Additionally, you can choose different people for different facets of your life. You can have one council of advisors for the relationship area of your life, another set for financial matters, another for spiritual questions, etc. It’s a good idea to take the time to sit down and write out your lists(s) of mentors. That way, you can really ponder who it is you would like to be more like, who you think could offer you great counsel, etc. Also, having a list written out gives you something physical to go to during times when you’re confused, when things just seem to be falling apart, or when you feel all alone and you’ve forgotten that you have these enlightened beings there to help guide you. So just for an example, I’ll share my list of people on my Wisdom Council.

My Financial Council Members

  • Robert Kiyosaki
  • Victor Antonio (host of the TV show “Life or Debt”)
  • Dave Ramsey

My General Life Issues Council Members

  • My Aunt Dorothy. She died 20 years ago, but she was courageous, smart, funny, loving, and one of the best people I ever met.
  • Oprah Winfrey. She has experienced a lot, she’s always evolving/growing, and she teaches me a lot.
  • Eleanor Roosevelt
  • My daughters. They are both very smart, rational, and level-headed. They bring me down to earth when I’m off bouncing around in fantasy land again, and they have my best interests at heart, not just what they want or prefer.
  • Deepak Chopra
  • My cousin in Minnesota. I think I met her once face-to-face, but we text each other often. She’s an overflowing fountain of understanding, compassion, knowledge, and useful advice.

My Spiritual Council Members

  • Neale Donald Walsch
  • Stuart Wilde
  • Isis (the Goddess)
  • Jesus. Not because I’m Christian (I’m not) but because he teaches many great things.
  • Paramahansa Yogananda
So the number of people on your council doesn’t matter, and you can add or subtract people as you go along and as you grow, evolve, and change. When your needs change, you can edit your council, excuse the ones who no longer align with who you’ve become, or add new ones that you “meet” along your journey.

How To Utilize Your Wisdom Council

You can use your Wisdom Council anytime you have a question you need an answer to or just need some support. Obviously, if some of the people are living and you have a way to contact them, by all means, do so. Ask them questions. Explain what your needs are. If someone on your list is living but you don’t know them personally, you can ask for their guidance in two ways. If you feel so inclined, take a moment to contact them through their website, social media, through their publisher, etc. You might be surprised how often they might actually respond. Or, if you’ve researched them fully and feel like you know them fairly well (even though you’ve never met), sit in silence and ask yourself, “What would (insert name) tell me about this?” (That reminds me of that bumper sticker that says “What Would Jesus Do?”). If you really sit in silence and think about who that person is and what they’d say, you will get your answers/advice/support. student-is-readyBe sure to take notes and jot it down because (a)you’re likely to forget when life gets “noisy” or messy (or even an hour after you do this exercise!). (b)If you keep notes, you can wait a month or 6 months or so. Then when you look back at your question and the advice you received, you can gauge how useful or accurate it turned out to be so that, in the future, you can maybe learn to trust your inner guidance more (if your council member is one you’ve not contacted personally) or how useful or reliable or helpful your person was (if it’s someone you actually contacted). They say the definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. I might add, if someone constantly gives you bad advice over and over again, you might, in the future, choose to use a different advisor/mentor. So unless you have a stellar memory, take a few notes so it’s easier to look back and gauge your successes, your growth, and the results of the advice you receive from the people you’re relying on for helpful guidance.

2. Listen To Your Higher Self

If you’re not keen on the idea of creating a Wisdom Council, you could just tap into the power of your higher self. The higher self goes by many names, such as the Divine Matrix, the All, God, Allah, the I Am, the universal consciousness, etc. There is an all-knowing, all-powerful energy that is everywhere, and you can tap into this field and find the answers or the advice and support that you seek. answersTo be able to tap into this energy and be able to receive answers, you have to be able to quiet all the mindless chatter in your head. Usually, this is accomplished through meditation. Or you could “zone out” by running, walking, or exercising for a length of time. Any number of activities could plunge you into this quiet, contemplative zone where the mind “let’s go” and insights and answers just come to you, seemingly from some unknown, outside place. Some people receive answers by writing down their question with the intention that their inner knowing will provide them an answer through their dreams. Then they go to sleep. Sometimes the answer just pops up in a dream (that they can later recall) or while showering or while driving, etc. The basic idea is that you know that by placing your intention to receive answers, the answers will come. They may not be the answers you expect, or they may not come in the manner you expect, but they will come so pay attention. Maybe you’re driving to work and a slogan on a billboard you pass jumps out at you and just seems like an answer to your question. Maybe a particular song pops up on the radio. You accidentally come to possess a new book that you would never choose for yourself. The point is to be open to all possibilities because the answers come in innumerable ways. And if you’re tuned in, you’ll get a sense where you just “know” that this is part of your answer.
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What do you think? Who do you consult when you need advice or guidance? Share your opinion in the comments below.