How do you know when you’ve “arrived?” What I’m asking is, How do you know when you’ve accomplished what you set out to accomplish, or that you have the life you want?
With some things, like taking a plane from one city to another, you know exactly when you’ve arrived. The aircraft stops, you get off the plane and you go about your business. But life is not always that cut and dry.
I suggest to you that too often we wait to do what we want to do, or experience what we desire to accomplish, because we are waiting for some power outside ourselves. We delay our joy and happiness by making the assumption that to achieve our goals we must go through a pre-determined set of mile markers. For example, “I can’t get a good job until I get my bachelors, masters or doctoral degree.” Therefore, no job or career, until the achievement of one or all of those goals, will ever be good enough to be “good.”
Here’s how I started thinking about this last week. As you may or may not know I’m in the process of completely re-designing my ministry and how I serve others. There are, of course, some components I will keep that have worked well for me and benefited those whom I have served over the past two decades. But other projects and opportunities I have in mind are brand new areas for me, a few using cutting-edge technology which I have yet to learn!
I’ll be 60 next year. I actually started thinking that with this new ministry I’ll be able to enjoy the life I want in another ten or twenty years. I got stuck for a moment in the shoulda/couldas. (NOTE: Please read the rest of this paragraph with a whiny voice.) “I shoulda done this twenty years ago. I coulda moved forward before now. Now because I delayed I won’t be able to enjoy the life I want for some time.”
WRONG! I know exactly what kind of life I want to have and – drum roll – are you ready? – I’m already living it! There isn’t anything I’ll be doing in twenty years that I don’t already do now. We have this idea in the U.S. that we have to work a long time to create the life we want and, in the back of our minds, feel like we might be too old or too feeble to enjoy it once we get there. Here’s a quote I love to remind myself of from time-to-time:
The world knows you in terms of your history,
but the universe knows you in terms of how you
are knowing yourself at this present moment.
Michael Hyatt writes an amazing blog. This week his topic is, “Why Retirement is a Dirty Word.” I re-tweeted a quote from him that speaks directly to what I’m writing about here: “If you’re doing meaningful work you enjoy, why would you ever want to quit?” This is exactly how I’m living my life, helping others to have the life they envision for themselves – not twenty or thirty years from today, but starting right now.
Let go of the past! Forget about what was and concentrate on what “is.” We do not have to wait for anything to enjoy the life we desire. We are only a thought away from changing our attitude and our outlook by simply changing our perception of what’s happening in front of our faces.
What has to happen before you will have the life you want? Do you feel something stands in the way of your happiness or a change needs to occur before you can be satisfied? Would you be willing to ask yourself if that is really true? We human beings are spectacular at convincing ourselves of what we can’t have. The magical answer to obtaining our desires is that we can just as well convince ourselves that we can have the life we want.
The universe is here to lovingly and rapidly rush to our aid. It is conspiring to give us what we want. The key is that we have to be willing to allow this to happen. What are you waiting for? Go for it!
In Spirit, Truth and Playfulness,
Terry
P.S. To read Michael’s full posting, click here!
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