Course I · Months 1 to 3
Find your center, and return to it.
Find it again before you respond. Three months of practice in Temperance, Awareness and Seasons, until the return to center holds under pressure.
The course
The return, trained until it is there under pressure.
Every capable person has a place they act from when nothing needs defending, and a strategy that takes over when something does. You probably know both well enough to describe them.
The first course trains the return, first in the body and then in the calendar. By the end of Month 3, you can find your center under pressure, and you hold criteria for your biggest commitments, written while you were standing in it.
Month 1 · Temperance
Every extreme is a signal to return.
The practice
Set three to five behavior targets, each with a Minimum you keep on the worst day and a Full Measure for a good one. Take an inventory of what you overdo and what you underdo. Take the VIA Survey and name where a top strength runs to excess. Name one unknown to meet this year with curiosity.
The weekly question
Where did I live at an extreme this week, and what brought me back?
Month 2 · Awareness
You can act only from where you are.
The practice
The center reset: slow breathing through the nose, and the witness, which observes a thought as an event. Close one channel that takes your attention and returns nothing.
The weekly question
When was I somewhere other than here, and what did it cost?
Month 3 · Seasons
Read the season before you choose the effort.
The practice
Write the governor: go and no-go criteria for the commitments that matter most, written while centered and held by a practice partner. Name the season you are in. A season of sacrifice gets an end date.
The weekly question
Was this a week to push or to recover, and which did I do?
Who is holding the pen? Find out in seven minutes, free.
Prefer to read first? The weekly essay is at masterylessons.com.