Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the earth.
There are hundreds of ways to find your way home.
— Rumi
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Gentle reader, I think that like you, I’ve always sought a life that lives the answer to that question, “There must be more to this”.
How DO you make the most of your moments, especially when you don’t know how many moments you might be given?
I’ve been around the mountains with this one.
I’ve searched. I've put myself in uncomfortable situations and purposely changed careers and locations numerous times – sometimes to great effect, often not.
But one thing I've realised is that no matter what I do or where I am, I still bring all of me along for the ride.
The great, positive, optimistic, adventurous, carefree and content me … and the negative, worried, angry just because, the nothing is ever good enough me too.
All those false summits in life where you think reaching a certain point or doing a certain thing will satisfy, but when you get there you realise it doesn’t and there must be something else and so you chase the next peak … that me always came for the ride too.
In my search to intentionally make a Good life, it turns out it’s not so much what I do –
(Big caveat though – learning that it’s okay to say no has been a huge thing for me, a people pleaser.
I’ve realised that making Good choices, choices that excite me, where there’s a big yes, is key –
Or more precisely, clearly being aware of the, “Yes because I think I should” decision making process … i.e. those Yes’s that often lead to dragging the feet and even resentment, has been super important …)
But mostly a life of Quality is not about what I do, but where I choose to put my attention.
How so?
Look, I’ve been around people who live blessed lives, and I’ve been with some who it seems everything goes wrong for them.
Yet the difference between a Good life and a life of struggle and suffering and disappointment isn’t the conditions of their lives.
It’s all down to their attitude to each and every moment.
You can have the best life in the world and completely miss it because you’re so focused on what’s wrong and what you don’t have.
You can have nothing, have that taken from you as well, and you can still be completely in love with life.
As Tim Ferriss once wrote, “It’s not that beauty is hard to find, it’s that it is easy to overlook.”
Beauty is easy to miss, because we're so focused on the urgent little things, on what “should be”, on what isn’t.
You know?
Mindfulness or mindlessness? Overlook nothing. Take nothing for granted.
Practice this. It’s a skill. There are hundreds of ways but don’t leave a great life to chance, to external circumstance. Overlook nothing!
Go well,
— Arjuna
PS.
Look (and I realise I’ve this is the second one of these – it’s my Kiwi roots showing) …
I know I keep banging on about Ascension.
But it’s the missing link for me, and countless others I know, to have freedom of choice, to be free of suffering through life and instead be totally engaged and alive.
If you’re tired of a run-away head, if you want a better attitude, if you want to be the person you know you can be and to live the life you were born to live …
Come and learn.
It’s beautiful in its simplicity and transformative in its power.
If you have any questions, just ask.
Next course is 7-9 July (starts 7pm) but be in quick. The summer courses always fill up quick.
Rant over. And talk more soon!