Our cares, wants, and worries are all so different when we are happy. The peace we experience assuages the most excessive, and often destructive, cravings and mollifies the nagging, trivial concerns that pervade our day-to-day lives. It is not a great mystery that this is why we spend so much time searching for happiness. Even if only for a few moments, the equanimity we find when engaged and content gives us freedom and independence. We want what we have and have what we want. We no longer question and just accept and appreciate who and where we are.
There is no shame in asking for help or looking outside ourselves for direction. Everything is connected, so what we do impacts the world, just as what is happening in our external environment directly affects us. To expect to have all the answers to our questions and problems, not only limits what we can achieve but easily becomes narcissistic folly. But at some point, we must stop searching and trust ourselves to make critical decisions. While inspiration and guidance can be found all around us, the choice of what we do and how we respond ultimately lies solely within us.
Dreaming is the first step in changing our reality. We either experience hardship or happiness and imagine how things could be, picturing what we really want. Visualizing the improved future is important, but if we stop there, the chances of our dreams coming true are very slim. We need to establish our beliefs, develop a plan to convert our ideas to results, and embark on executing the vision, committing to persevere through all obstacles. While it is sometimes nice just to fantasize to escape our current situations, if we do nothing about it, that is probably exactly what will happen.
You know how old you’d be by the time you achieve that one thing you always dreamed of doing if you started today? The same age you’ll be if you don’t. We often stop ourselves from pursuing an important goal because we feel it’s too late or it will take too much time. But we need to remember, we’re going to be that age anyway. Why not be doing what we love? It’s better to be struggling toward what we value than proficient at something simply because we are good at it or have invested a lot of time in it.
Coincidences happen too often to be random and meaningless. But reading too much into them can be dangerous as well. We have to be careful we’re not just collecting and assimilating events into the story we want to tell to justify our actions or validate our beliefs. After all we’ll never truly know what they really mean. They could simply be warnings to alter our course or encouragement to continue. But rather than obsessing about the meaning, perhaps we should merely observe their occurrence as the special happening that they are: a spark to momentarily lift the darkness around us.
We want our lives to go smoothly and work hard so that they do. This often creates expectations that they will and always should. When they don’t, we become frustrated and often feel lost. We forget that the ups and downs, bumbles and blunders, and gaffes and oversights are where the best lessons and stories reside. Rather than hurry over or around these bumps, we should appreciate and mine them for the treasures that they are. Our mistakes are not independent from one another. Understanding their meaning and connection reveals our purpose and provides direction, creating a unique and extraordinary trip.
When things are not going the way we want them to, we become frustrated and often feel powerless to change our current realities. We try distracting ourselves with other activities and keeping our minds occupied. But while that may make us feel better, it does little to improve our situations and often just makes things worse. We end up dwelling on the past and obsessing about the future—anything to escape. But we forget, we are not expected to correct what has happened and know what is coming. We just need to deal with the present openly and with compassion.
Our days are not independent from one another. We begin each day with the results and experience from all the preceding ones. As much as we’d like to forget or change some things that have happened, they can’t be undone. That doesn’t mean, however, that the outcome is permanent. Our world is dynamic, never the same moment to moment. This continual evolution impacts everything around us, including our ever-changing selves. While we can’t alter the past, we can reshape our present by the choices we make each day. We are the link between the past and future we desire.
Life presents us with a continual stream of choices. We travel down the path, coming to one fork in the road after the other. We consider the outcomes carefully, afraid whatever we choose will surely be wrong. Once we make our selection, we know the other realities presented to us fade and the choice we made becomes our truth. The pressure to make the right decision can become quite debilitating. But this uncertainty is a sign we are not ready to decide. When we are aligned with our future, there is no choice. We accept the determination has already been made and move forward.
