How do people know when their lives lack abundance? The most common ‘give away’ is that they are deeply unhappy with some phase or other of their situation. It is often the case that people think of material possessions when they consider abundance. But the truth of the matter is that the people that have accumulated a great deal of personal wealth, but who still remain unhappy, do not experience an abundant life. It is often a sad fact of life that there are many wealthy individuals who despite their wealth have few friends, or do not even trust those that they have, and end up living under fulfilled existences.

In starting to develop abundance, then, needs to start with the way life is approached including beliefs, thinking patterns and emotional habits. If a person is willing to change the way they think (and speak) about things and to develop mature and positive emotional responses, they can turn their life around.

Our world is filled with abundance, but many people never experience feeling that abundance. In order to experience it, you have to be open to receiving abundance. But if you have hatred, unforgiveness, worries, shame, anxiety, anger, and similar emotions, you are blocked by that negativity, and you can’t receive abundance. You can’t even recognize it because you have been blinded by your own negativity.

No one can truly achieve a life of abundance if they do not honestly examine their past and heal the hurt they are still holding inside. Many people around the world continue to suffer, long after the original tragedy or trauma that shook them to the core has passed on. Those events elicited negative feelings and emotions and faulty beliefs and the baggage they carry from those events continues to cause them pain. They will remain stuck until they learn to release the past, forgive, and let themselves live the abundant life they really deserve.

Developing abundance is in fact developing one’s self. We need to analyze the way that we think, the way that we react to events as they unfold. We need to spot the patterns that our past behavior has fallen into, and we need to be ready to change those patterns, to heal past hurts and open the door to abundance.

While changing how you think and feel will not come easily, you don’t have to do it alone. Modern therapies can help, from EFT or applied kinesiology (energy therapies) to cognitive behavior therapy; but you need to commit to doing what is required for as long as necessary to change your life. A large part of attracting abundance starts inside you.

But changing the inner person is in itself not enough. We have to see and shape the things that are going on around us. We need to be positive and develop a plan for progressing with our move from where we are now into a position of abundance.

The road to abundance is trodden via a combination of inner change and outer focus. There are many people who although they are good goal setters and achievers don’t benefit from an abundant life because they simply do not believe or even see it. Having the benefit is no good if you do not know how to appreciate it. It is like having no benefit at all and cannot create happiness or contentment. To truly benefit from abundance you must first be able to recognize it, and second, you must be able to appreciate it.

Developing abundance is a worthwhile goal. It’s not selfish to live an abundant life. In fact, it enables people to be generous to others and frees them from self-focus necessary when struggling to survive. The process of developing abundance usually takes some time, but it is a satisfying journey that transforms individuals and their communities.