illusions

Last night I cracked open a new book titled Illusions.

This small book’s subtitle is “The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah”.

I don’t know why I purchased the book, but I do remember how it got on my radar. One of my closest friends, shoutout Tyrone, sent me a text of a picture of the book Jonathan Livingston Seagull and told me I had to read it–I remember the title of that book from growing up, but I know I never read it. As I often do, when someone sends me a book recommendation I order it–I’ve never received a book recommendation that didn’t have a purpose for me.

Richard Bach is the author of Jonathan Livingston Seagull, as well as Illusions. So I know how I came across Illusions, but I’m not sure what prompted me to purchase it, along with the sequel Illusions II.

After last night, I now know why I bought Illusions, and I believe Jonathan Livingston Seagull was actually meant to bring me to it–that book has a great story that aligns with living an authentic life, but Illusions holds a much deeper meaning for me.

I’m not going to tell you about the story, but I am going to share a few quotes that really spoke to me—they all come from the Messiah’s Handbook in the story. Some of these quotes are very personal to some topics I’ve been exploring and others I think are universal; I won’t tell you which is which so I don’t influence how you receive them.

“You are led through your lifetime by the inner creature, the playful spiritual being, that is your real self. Don’t turn away from the possible futures before you’re certain you don’t have anything to learn from them. You’re always free to change your mind and choose a different future, or different past.”

“Learning is finding out what you already know. Doing is demonstrating that you know it. Teaching is reminding others that they know just as well as you. You are all learners, doers, teachers.”

"There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts."

“Your only obligation in any lifetime is to be true to yourself. Being true to anyone else or anything else is not only impossible, but the mark of a fake messiah.”

I could go on sharing, but I’ll stop here for today.

🎧 Listen to today's Note on the LifeDesign+ podcast.​

See you tomorrow and keep pursuing,

JC

🦅 Some ways I might be able to help you live your authentic life:

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📝 LifeDesign+ LifeDesign+ is rooted in the Kinder Institute of Life Planning’s EVOKE process, which is a five-step process to help discover what your authentic life looks like and begin to design a plan to bring that life to reality. It continues to incorporate the alignment of your spirit, mind, and body to ensure you evolve with your authentic life, as the authentic life is not a destination, it’s an evolution.

💸 AlignedLife+ AlignedLife+ (and the one-time engagement AlignedLife) takes LifeDesign+ to the next level by aligning your finances with your authentic life at RLS Wealth. For individuals looking for a financial advisor to help design and manage their financial plan while maintaining the alignment of spirit, mind, body, and money, AlignedLife+ was created specifically for you.

📈 LifeDesign+ for financial advisors LifeDesign+ for financial advisors mirrors the LifeDesign+ relationship, including the focus on the alignment of spirit, mind, and body, with an important distinction—once the plan for your authentic life has been designed, we shift our focus to integrating your new plan with your practice.

🤝 Outsourced life planning As your outsourced life planner, you bring me in to take your client through the Kinder Institute of Life Planning’s EVOKE process to help them better understand who they are, what they want their life to look like, and create a vision of this life for you to execute on the financial plan. Since you are their financial advisor, you will be a part of each of the meetings, so you understand the “why” behind your client’s new plan.