I’ve helped them see their lives as a canvas for self-expression that could, and should, reflect their personal passions and values. You too can open yourself up to the possibility of creatively transforming any crisis, loss or change in your life by following this three-step process based upon my book, “Wise Mind, Open Mind.”

Step One: Letting Go of the Past and Resistance

The art of creative transformation begins with the willingness to be mindful of your hidden resistance to making a change, examining it and breaking it down so that you can sweep it away like sand on a doorstep. If unwanted change has occurred, you’re likely to become angry or upset, and struggle to regain what’s been lost. You might find yourself closing your eyes to any other avenues available to you, obsessing about the past and trying to reclaim what was once yours. This resistance blocks you from recognizing that what lies ahead for you might actually make you happier than you’ve ever been.

If all signs point to the need for change, it’s important not to deny them and cling to the status quo even as it’s slipping away. Instead explore your own resistance to change and let go of all that’s holding you back, so that you can be in open mind and accept, and even embrace, the impermanent nature of life. Then you can stop feeling like the victim of circumstances and begin to see that you, too, can transform yourself and your life in a positive and exciting way.

Step Two: Learn How to Tune into Your Creative Unconscious

The second step is tuning in and listening to the wisdom of your soul or unconscious, the state in which core creativity takes place, beyond the limitations of the mind’s thought processes. Whenever you reconnect to this core, authentic self through open mind, the temporary circumstances of life stop distracting you. You’re able to trust that the creative process will produce opportunities and possibilities in due time.

To access your core creativity and stop identifying with your ego or false self, which insists, “I can’t,” “I shouldn’t,” and “I’ll never” start to develop a meditation practice that you do for five to twenty minutes a day. I particularly recommend a mindfulness or insight meditation practice, which allows you to see the true nature of your experiences. Other forms of meditation that help you access an open mind are prayer, contemplation, mindful movement such as martial arts, tai chi and yoga, and just being in nature.

Step Three: Learn How to Move Forward with a Practical Plan

The final step is to create a practical plan to manifest your goals. Any plan or vision requires research if you want to make it a reality. We’ve all known people who made a major move too quickly, without thinking through the details, because they were so eager to meet their goals.

Quite often, my clients begin the process of envisioning a new life by insisting that they need more money. If you feel this way, explore this idea mindfully. Instead of assuming that money is your golden ticket to a fulfilling life, think about how you can increase the number and range of opportunities available to you. Learning about how people have overcome obstacles and achieved success can help you identify the elements in their winning formulas, but then you must apply their insights and advice to your own life.

If you know what you need to do visual reminders, such as a vision board may help keep you on track. Figuring out how long it should take to reach your goals can be difficult and can generate anxiety or worry. When you look at your goals and your checklist for manifesting your vision, you may find that your progress isn’t as steady or as spectacular as you’d hoped. Also gather and work with a wisdom council of support. Your friends, family or neighbors can offer you practical or emotional support at times, but to come through a crisis and make the biggest breakthroughs in personal transformation, it’s best to cast a wide net and draw in support from multiple sources.

Rebuilding after any great loss can be extremely difficult, but again and again, I’ve seen people use meditation and the art of creative transformation to pull themselves out of a valley of despair and even create successes they never would’ve dreamed of before their initial loss. A forward-thinking view can lead to reinvention and healing.

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Ronald Alexander, Ph.D. is the author of the widely acclaimed book, Wise Mind, Open Mind: Finding Purpose and Meaning in Times of Crisis, Loss, and Change. He is the director of the OpenMind Training® Institute, practices mindfulness-based mind-body psychotherapy and leadership coaching in Santa Monica, CA, for individuals and corporate clients. He has taught personal and clinical training groups for professionals in Integral Psychotherapy, Ericksonian mind-body healing therapies, mindfulness meditation, and positive psychology nationally and internationally since 1970. (www.openmindtraining.com)

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By looking at these four central tenets of Buddhism we can better understand how micromanaging our circumstances can cause us to become agitated and restricted. Instead when we learn to let go of our attachments we can transform our lives in an innovative way.

The four noble truths can help us break out of the need to be in control and, instead enter into an acceptance of the present moment. Only in the present will we find the courage to cross the threshold of the unknown and relax into the changes we cannot avoid. I find it helpful to take a mindful pause throughout the day and check in with one or more of them. It’s a lovely compass to follow.

Here are the four noble truths from my book, Wise Mind, Open Mind and how they can help you let go of resistance and move forward out of your dilemma.

The first noble truth: In life, there is suffering, because of the impermanent nature of things.

Because we feel more secure when we have a sense of predictability, we develop a great capacity for denying a simple truth: that nothing stays the same. Then the unpredictability of life shows us that even if we do everything “right” and exercise every precaution, we can still face unexpected loss.

When this happens the shock can make it hard to regain your equanimity and exercise nonreactvity. Too often, rather than surrender to the inevitability of change and work creatively with it, people resort to the fear-based behavior of trying to take charge and force other people and situations to conform to their expectations. The first noble truth of Buddhism is a reminder not to slip into the avoidance behavior of denial. While it’s not wise to create gloomy thoughts about how matters might take a turn for the worse, consciously ignoring the reality that all situations transform sets you up for a great shock when that time comes.

The second noble truth: Suffering is due to attachments and expectations, to grasping and clinging.

Your inability to avoid change may make you angry, sad, and frustrated. It can be hard to let go of the false belief that the only way to achieve happiness again is to regain what’s been lost. Even when you know you can’t reverse the situation, you may agonize over this reality.

Clinging to what once was, avoiding the process of grief and acceptance, causes paralysis. Grasping for a future set of circumstances identical to the past holds you back from discovering what better roads lie ahead, outside of your sight. The desire to backtrack or reconstruct will likely result in your walking around in circles, lost in the dark woods, instead of peering around corners to find new paths.

The third noble truth: It’s possible to end suffering by giving up attachments (clinging) and expectations (grasping).

The shift in perspective that comes when we recognize that there’s no such thing as a permanent sense of happiness begins our healing from suffering. The next step is to accept that we must broaden our definition of what we need in order to be happy, giving up the habits of clinging and grasping, as well as the need to control external circumstances.

After emerging from the shock of a great loss, we’re even more despairing about the possibility of being joyful again. However, the third noble truth offers us the promise of a new way of living that’s as satisfying, if not more fulfilling, than the old. It beckons us to begin the process of transformation.

The fourth noble truth: The way to end suffering due to clinging and grasping is through balance and living in the present.

It’s important to balance a thirst for something better with an acceptance of what is, right now. Balance allows you to live in the present moment and trust that your acceptance will clear the mist of confusion and distractions, and show you the way to move forward into happiness again. Here’s the paradox of change: until you can accept what is, you cannot move into what might be.

When we cling to the past or what no longer serves us, we contract ourselves to the point where we’re unable to be nourished and invigorated by the present moment. We have to accept that what’s past has truly passed in order to open up to what the present moment offers us. In this opening we become nourished, refreshed and revitalized.

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The mind has the marvelous capacity to re-live the emotions connected to a memory over and over again, each time you recall it. When you close your eyes and imagine yourself standing at the shore of a lake, happily tossing in stones with your grandfather at your side, you recreate the feelings of contentment and love. You can use such a wholesome memory as an antidote to emotional pain whenever you feel unloved or insecure.

In my therapy practice when a client has an unwholesome self-judgment, I help her experience its wholesome antidote. For example, an interior designer I work with felt that she wasn’t unique or special. I knew from our sessions that this belief was holding her back from expanding her business and I asked her to recall a time when she felt unique or special.

Sometimes my clients insist that they never, not for a moment, felt a particular wholesome quality, but I always press this point, because I know that with some effort, they can find one, however small. I tell them that it’s as if their computer has given them the error message “file not found” because they’re searched for it in the wrong area of their hard drive. Through a mindfulness meditation practice, you can recover such moments that the conscious mind has forgotten and “restore the file.” Then you can reprogram your belief system, consciously choosing to lay a new neural network. However, if you decide to retain that file, you reinforce the old unwholesome belief, ensuring that it will affect your self-image in the future.

You can return repeatedly to this wholesome memory, all the while using it as a positive antidote. When you do, you’ll reinforce a new, consciously chosen, wholesome self-judgment. My client was able to access a memory of putting her senior art project on display for the class, and the tremendous admiration and respect her classmates showered on her. Each time she recalled this memory, it re-created in her feelings of being talented, creative, and special.

Here are two more tips from my book, Wise Mind, Open Mind on how to transform a painful memory:

Create a New Memory

Another technique for transforming an unwholesome memory into a wholesome one is to consciously rewrite a traumatic memory. Doing so lessens the intensity of the unwholesome feelings attached to it and lays new neural networks for remembering a positive, enhancing experience (albeit one created in the imagination). By creating this healing memory, you ensure that whenever the original memory arises in your awareness, it won’t cause you as much pain as it used to.

Make an Unwholesome Memory Wholesome

Practice the following mindful meditation:

Becoming more insightful and reflective through a mindfulness practice leads to greater awareness of the unwholesome memories produced by your mind. You may be tempted to be critical of your ability to meditate or quickly shift the painful memory, but what you really are is a person making a long and sometimes arduous journey of self-discovery and self-acceptance. Don’t hold yourself to unrealistic standards and expect to quickly transform what are often lifelong thinking habits.

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