
TL;DR: In this, Part Three of the Four-Part series about Steven losing his keys, the author shares how they guided Steven through the emotional fallout of losing his keys. Doing so helped Steven discover that the contrast revealed his readiness—and how realignment begins when we stop performing and start feeling the process.
Steven sat across from me in-session online, his voice quiet, his energy low. I knew immediately he was in a very low vibrational state. The emotional turbulence of the past week lingered: the lost keys, his boss’s reaction, and most importantly, the stories he had been telling himself had him really low.
What made this session particularly rich was what it revealed—not just about Steven, but about how deep this practice really goes when applied in the midst of real-world contrast.
The session became a masterclass in vibrational leverage. Not because it resolved everything in a single sitting, or because I did anything special. It was a masterclass because it revealed how even seasoned practitioners can get caught in the swirl of their own stories… and how beautiful it is when they begin to emerge from that swirl.
Steven tried to apply one of the foundational Positively Focused processes. The process works every time, which is why it’s part of the basic practice framework. He tried applying it on his own. And to his credit, he didn’t just mentally revisit the steps. He truly attempted to walk himself through acknowledgment, acceptance, recognizing what his experience told him, and finally, amplification of the shift that happens naturally in step three.
Something wasn’t landing, however.
When the Practice Is Real
He described how he had tried to say the words aloud, to walk through the steps and feel some relief.
“I did the process,” he said. “But it didn’t really shift anything.”
But the practice does create a shift. So we had to troubleshoot. That’s when we uncovered the subtle but crucial gap: he had performed the process mechanically, without the presence that makes it effective.
That’s not uncommon. When the contrast is hot—when keys are missing, a boss is disappointed, and inner narratives are spiraling—it’s easy to rush the process instead of resting in it. That’s what Steven had done. He didn’t skip the steps, but he skipped over the alignment that makes them work.
So we slowed everything down. Together, we walked back through each stage—not as a checklist, but as a vibrational recalibration.
We began at the beginning: acknowledgment. That meant naming all the stories that were active in Steven’s consciousness giving rise to his negative emotions. The process is not about acknowledging them as facts, or the truth. It’s about acknowledging their presence within him. Stories like: “If I lose something, I’m irresponsible.” “I can’t be trusted.” And “Now I’ve ruined my chances at a promotion.”
Coming into acceptance
These weren’t new beliefs. They were old ones. Echoes of childhood moments, especially those involving his mother, where he felt criticized or held to unexpressed standards. His current boss, Richard, had become a mirror. Not because Richard was behaving badly, but because Steven’s vibration had summoned a version of him that matched old patterns.
This wasn’t failure. This was graduation.
The contrast had intensified not because Steven was off-track, but because he was ready to move beyond these stories he created long ago. As I reminded him gently, “You wouldn’t be experiencing this level of contrast if you weren’t ready for it.”
The next step was accepting the beliefs are there. This second step is different from the first. It’s about letting go of resistance and instead welcoming the old beliefs back into us. Resisting, not accepting a belief is what creates resistance. And resistance amplifies that which we resist. For Steven, this wasn’t about accepting fault, accepting fault would amplify resistance. That’s because there’s no such thing as blame or fault. Instead, he needed to accept what was.

What “was” was, He didn’t have his keys. His boss was disappointed. His momentum had taken him into a tailspin. But none of that was wrong. Thinking it wrong creates resistance. These things are simply what had occurred. By making peace with the moment—not as a judgment, but as a reflection—Steven began to find his footing.
Only then could we move to Step Three, the vibrational pivot.
Amplifying higher vibrations.
Here, I asked Steven to consider what his Broader Perspective was feeling. Was it shaming him? No. Was it blaming him? Certainly not. His Broader Perspective was seeing the wholeness of the moment. The opportunity. The expansion. A perfection so exquisite, created between him and his reflected reality. A perfection that could lead to more empowerment.
Steven’s eyes welled up when he saw that.
“I’ve been so afraid I ruined everything,” he said, voice quiet. “But now I get it. This isn’t about the keys.”
No, it wasn’t. It was about more alignment, expansion and empowerment. That clarity of awareness indicated Steve felt better. At least, at the very least, he felt relief, which is improved vibration. Now we entered the amplification phase.
This part isn’t about affirmations or hype. It’s about tuning in to the new emotional frequency and letting it fill the space. We do that through our imagination. We use our imagination to create new beliefs, new thoughts about what happened that stand in for old ones as the old ones soothe.
For Steven, that meant resting in a new truth: That he is not defined by mistakes. Trustworthiness isn’t earned—it’s embodied. That this moment, painful as it seemed, was sacred.
By the end of the session, Steven felt significantly better. The relief wasn’t euphoric, but it was stabilizing. He still wasn’t sure how things would unfold at work the next day. He still had concerns about how Richard would treat him. But he was no longer a victim of that perceived uncertainty.
He was still floating, still alive. He had reclaimed his oars. And from that place, even uncertain waters felt navigable.
Takeaway: Mastery Isn’t About Avoiding Contrast
The Four-Step Process outlined above doesn’t promise immediate resolution to external conditions. This is not magic. Neither is the rest of the Positively Focused framework. But it does offer something better: vibrational clarity and alignment with one’s Broader Perspective. And clarity is what allows new versions of reality to emerge.
New versions emerge as we walk into them. We can’t walk into them, however, if we don’t know where they are. Alignment with our Broader Perspective shows us where the doorways are and inspires us to walk through them into the new reality.
Steven hadn’t yet found his keys. He didn’t know what would happen tomorrow. But he was no longer at the mercy of momentum. He had re-entered his power—not as a performer or pleaser, but as a conscious creator. Contrast didn’t defeat him. It refined him. And in that, he was already victorious.
Read the final chapter tomorrow.


















