The Clarity Technique
(Note that this class is now lesson 7 of Freedom Practice – 2 and will be updated shortly, but the main content will remain the same as it has been in the previous versions of the Freedom Practice. Once updated, this message will be removed)
The CLARITY Technique is described here in detail. It does not require audio guidance instructions, so there is no video for this technique. It is fully explained below.
First, a few words from someone who used the CLARITY Technique.
“It was in January 2009 that I gained a profound insight that my Higher Self has an amazing level of Inner Wisdom.
I used to be late for appointments quite often, which I did not understand as I was regarded as a person of responsibility. People know me as a well-seasoned professional coach with passion and a big heart. Obviously, being late did not seem to live up to the expectations of others and myself. Strangely enough, I was very punctual and even very early to many other appointments.
One day, I asked Tom why I do that, and he asked me what I would get from being late. It was “freedom” that I came up with as an answer as I did not want to feel “obligated” to do things. Tom asked me another question if I was making these appointments because they were things that I wanted to do or because I felt I “should” do them. I had never really thought of that before. As I did think about it, I realized that the appointments that I was late to were in fact, ones that I really didn’t want to be going to.
Tom explained to me that when I make a decision out of a sense of obligation, this is a conditioned response. It isn’t my authentic Self deciding but my conditioned self that is making the decision and later, I regret it. I was being late to appointments as a kind of rebellion, a kind of way of showing that I resented having to be there and was not being true to myself. My Higher Self kept sending me signals that those commitments would not make me genuinely happy, and I was not listening!
Tom gently guided me through how to use the CLARITY Technique. He said, “Sharon, whenever you are asked to do something, and you are not sure if you want to do it or not, wait for clarity. Buy time. Say, ‘I’ll have to check my schedule and get back to you about that.’ This way, you can wait and feel whether or not you really want to do that thing for joy or if it is more from a sense of obligation or duty.”
So I followed his advice. Two wonderful things have happened. First, I now only make commitments out of love, not out of a sense of obligation which brings me joy. And second, because of that, I am never late anymore. On the contrary, I’m very early to appointments, and my life is filled with joy!
Now I use the CLARITY Technique to allow me to get the clarity to be true to myself about all kinds of things. This automatically makes me much more fully present in every moment. Life is wonderful!” ”
– Sharon Yoon-kyung Noh
The CLARITY Technique goes against the grain of a lot of our cultural conditioning. Being impulsive and reactive are expressions of our learned conditioned responses and are not expressions of Pure Awareness. “Just do it!” is an all too common mantra. Certainly, there are times when it is essential to act quickly, but quick actions, when aligned with clarity, are distinctively different than acting impulsively. Most people are unaware that such a distinction between the two even exists.
How to Do the CLARITY Technique
In theory, the CLARITY Technique is simple. You just… WAIT. But what do you wait for? How long do you wait? How do you know when you have waited long enough? The answer to these questions is to wait for clarity that comes from Pure Awareness as opposed to unconsciously reacting to your conditioning. The key is to understand what it means to experience clarity from Pure Awareness. Our decision-making process is controlled by our thoughts and our emotions – which for most people, originates from their conditioning. We are programmed to react, not to decide. This means we aren’t even making our own decisions – our conditioned responses are deciding for us.
So how can one experience clarity? First, it is important to understand the difference between two kinds of thoughts – natural intentions and conditioned responses. With Inner Greatness Optimizing, we distinguish between the two kinds of thoughts.
Natural intentions are ones that easily manifest with the least amount of effort. You may feel inspired to take a specific action, and it has the quality of effortlessness – the same kind that makes the grass grow, or the clouds float by in the sky. It’s that “being in the zone” kind of feeling, a sense of frictionless flow.
Conversely, conditioned responses are learned behaviors, often unconscious. Although we may have become accustomed to responding to these conditioned behaviors, this makes it difficult to distinguish between effortlessness and the nature of our conditioning. Conditioned responses tend to be more like trying to force things to be the way we expect them to be, trying to get other people to do things our way, or chasing after something that we think will give us a sense of wholeness by attaining it. These kinds of decisions and resulting actions are coming from thoughts that are generated out of stories about what we “think” should happen.
Everyone has the ability to have CLARITY about what is naturally aligned for them, but this is typically covered up by layers of conditioning and reactive emotions. Think of impulsive purchases you have made that you later regretted making. Or getting into a relationship when your intuition told you not to, but you did anyway, and it resulted in misery and suffering. Have you ever made impulsive decisions about career, money, or health issues where it yielded disastrous results?
Many people have a deep-seated habit of acting on their impulses while unaware that they are caught up in non-clarity. Non-clarity has a feeling of pressure about it or feelings of confusion, frustration, fear, or vague discomfort. These feelings may in fact, be the very barriers that block clarity. You can use the IN Technique to feel into these feelings at the central, strongest part of the energy and complete the experience. You are then no longer in the grip of your emotions. When this occurs, you will experience a quietness, a sense of expansion, and wholeness.
The ability to have CLARITY is simple, but like all of the Pure Awareness Techniques, it involves doing something that is the exact opposite of what we have been conditioned to do. Which is to WAIT for CLARITY. Waiting for clarity means you do not make decisions impulsively or emotionally. The basic guideline is: if your decision feels emotionally charged, don’t act on the decision. Instead, wait for clarity.
Contrary to what you may believe, waiting for clarity is not a passive process. Waiting is a time to gather more information and allow circumstances to develop more clearly, and it is especially a time to consistently practice the Pure Awareness Techniques. To receive maximum benefit from the Pure Awareness Techniques, practice it is essential to increase your emotional competence and proficiency. For example, you can use the IN Technique to fully feel any feelings that the potential decision is bringing up or the KNOWING Technique to check in with your inner knowing. See what kind of guidance you receive, even if it means you wait a while longer for clarity.
The Clarity Technique is different from other Pure Awareness Techniques. There isn’t any instructional audio file to listen to on how to practice this technique except one that you can choose to install inside yourself that repeats – Wait for clarity, Wait for clarity.
You may ask, what does clarity look like? What does it feel like? Maybe it would help to describe what clarity is not. It is not emotional. It is not pressured for time. It is not concerned about missing out on some opportunity. It doesn’t have anything to do with what anyone else thinks or feels about it. Clarity has nothing to do with intellectual understanding.
Clarity is a calm, inner quiet knowing that something is right for you, and you decide to take action from this state of being. This is called being true to yourself. What are you really being true to? You are being true to your unique purpose. Waiting for clarity allows you to align to a place within yourself where you are not reacting to your conditioning or outer demands.
There is no doubt, uncertainty or questioning within this state of being. You simply KNOW. This is Pure Awareness – the source of all clarity. This is the optimal state for making decisions in your life.
Each of us is here for a purpose and have our own intrinsic rhythm and contributions to make according to how our individuality is designed. If you are impulsively responding to what you think you should do, or how to please someone else, or avoiding doing something because you are afraid of some potential consequences, you are going to continuously experience frustration, fear, anger, bitterness and disappointment.
Why not learn how to wait for CLARITY? It’s so much better to align yourself with nature’s principle of least effort than it is to struggle to make things happen while living in a story that is disconnected with what is real and true for you. The next time you are about to make a decision, wait for inner clarity before you proceed and see what happens. You will be very, very glad that you did. When you begin experiencing the magic that comes from waiting for CLARITY, you will be amazed!
Lesson 8 – The Knowing Technique