While some people face life-changing events, most of what defines and redefines us as people is not the stuff of big-budget epic movies, but rather the boring, mundane stuff of everyday life.
How can we grab hold of those little things that say so much about who we are — and use them to move us closer to who we want to be? We have to go through an ongoing process that involves:
1. Discovery
The key to change in your life — and really, the key to satisfaction as well — is self-knowledge. Take some time to go over and record the moments that reflect problems you’re dealing with, as well as the moments that are typically “you.” The idea is to see patterns emerge. These patterns will be the grist for your analytical mill in the next stage.
2. Analysis
Look at your inventory of “totally you” moments — what do they say about who you are? Now, who do you want to be? What’s meaningful for you, what values do you want to realize in your daily life?
3. Intention
At this point, it’s time to think about change: what do you intend to do about all this? The trick here is to be positive, not negative. It’s important that you find the motivation and intention within yourself if you’re to make real change that sticks. Doing things because you know others think they’re what you should do, or worse, to “show them,” might get a short-term shift out of you, but over the long term isn’t likely to be very satisfying — or self-sustaining.
Personal change is hard, and harder still because there’s so much little stuff going on in our lives that all push and pull us in different directions. Which is precisely why it’s so important to pay attention to the little things, no matter how trivial they might seem.
Inspiration for the day
Responsibility is not a burden. It is the key that enables you to exercise control over your own destiny. Only by taking responsibility are you able to move life in the direction of your own dreams and visions. Responsibility fully engages the best of who you are.
Responsibility can be difficult, time-consuming, unfair, inconvenient and uncomfortable. Yet it also brings you to a level of empowerment that cannot be reached in any other way.
At the heart of true achievement is responsibility. An essential element of meaningful fulfillment is responsibility.
Every great opportunity is an opportunity to take responsibility. Whatever the situation, the most successful way forward is to act with responsibility.
No matter what has happened, or who is to blame, or how it all came to be, choose to take full responsibility for your life. For that is the first step in making it great.
– Ralph Marston
Inspiration for the day
Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Inspiration for the day
This is actually a paraphrase of a Buddhist teaching
called the "Dhammapada" which is attributed to the Buddha.
It reads:
Nothing is as real as a dream. The world can change around you,
but your dream will not.
Responsibilities need not erase it. Duties need not
obscure it.
Because the dream is within you, no one can take it
away.
- Unknown
Inspiration for the day
You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself in any direction you choose.
~Dr. Seuss
Inspiration for the day
The question is not whether we will die, but how we will live.
Borysenko, Joan
Inspiration for the day
No problem at all
It’s perfectly natural to feel resistance toward the things you have to do. Yet there is no need for that resistance to get the best of you. You can acknowledge that resistance and allow it. Then, you can just as easily choose to let it go.
After all, the resistance is something you have created. Without your active support, it melts away.
Imagine the freedom of simply doing what must be done, without having to fight against it. You can always choose to enjoy that freedom and the effectiveness it brings.
It’s normal to feel resistance when circumstances or other people compel you to do something. That’s true even if it’s something you would enjoy doing anyway.
Keep in mind that most of what makes a task unpleasant is your attitude toward it. Acknowledge your resistance, quickly let it go, and many of the things you once dreaded will become no problem at all.
— Ralph Marston
Inspiration for the day
The Wolf Credo
Respect the elders
Teach the young
Cooperate with the pack
Play when you can
Hunt when you must
Rest in between
Share your affections
Voice your feelings
Leave your mark
~Del Goetz
Inspiration for the day
Recent Comments