A few weeks ago, I returned to the classroom of Dennis Dalton, the most important college professor of my life. From the back of an amphitheater seating several hundred students, I realized how much things had evolved at Columbia and Barnard. The lecture hall was now equipped with a wireless sound system, webcams, video projectors, wireless internet. Students were using computers to record the lecture and to take notes. Heads were buried in screens, the tap tap of hundreds of keyboards like rain on the roof.

On this afternoon, April 16, 2008, Dalton was describing the satyagraha of Mahatma Gandhi, building the discussion around the Amritsar massacre in 1919, when British colonial soldiers opened fire on 10,000 unarmed Indian men, women and children trapped in Jallianwala Bagh Garden.

Jobs are hard to come by, layoffs have been slower but still prevalent, industries are shrinking and disappearing and all that we have has lost a lot of its value. It’s been called a recession, it’s teetered on a depression, but what has failed to be mentioned is that it’s also a time a time of great permission.

When the rules change and the status quo is gravely interrupted, it is actually a time of great opportunity for those that are not too terrified (or paralyzed) to act on it. If we give ourselves permission to follow our own hearts and inner road maps instead of waiting for a new status quo to take root, we are looking at making new rules and shattering preconceptions about what can and can not be accomplished.

The core lesson in this chapter is based on one you learned as a child: “If you don’t have anything nice to say about somebody, don’t say anything at all.” We only have to modify this adage a little so that “somebody” includes yourself and the situations in which you find yourself.

The idea is, very simply, to reach for a positive feeling before you speak, whether it’s in your head or out loud. If you can learn to do this one thing, you’ll be amazed at how much better you feel and, consequently, how much your relationships and your life will improve as well.

Many people have goals and dreams. Very often you will hear people use these terms interchangeably as if they were the same thing. I’m sure you’ve been asked, “So what are your goals in life?” or “What is your dream?”  They are not the same.  Clear understanding of what your dreams verses goals are is key to manifesting the fulfillment in your life.

We all have dreams…we are born dreamers.  You have heard the old saying that young men have visions, but old men dream dreams.  This great proverb defines “old men” having dreams because old men speak of the wisdom, skill, and mastery of one’s innate ability to manifest their dreams into reality.