life lessons – Page 14

Keep Going

The path ahead is unclear. It is scary. It is often filled with obstacles that we have to cross to make it up that mountain. We find ourselves on our way and then we take a tumble and we find ourselves not back to square one but somewhere in between and that is where I am now.

The weekend was filled with uncertainties and all my good intentions seemed to have flown out the window. I thought I was doing so well only to find that being on my way, moving on from the here and now is a long process. It doesn’t happen overnight and neither does it happen in a few days, a few weeks or a few months. It is an ongoing process which involves falling, picking yourself back up and having the courage to say, “Here I go again!”

“When you walk in the fire, you start becoming fireproof.” Hiral Nagada

I spent the weekend looking for excuses as to why I CAN’T do this and that is often the case with me. It is easier to look for excuses than to move on. Fear is another factor that plays into my inner being and that little voice within, the one that acts like a little kid keeps tugging and says you are not capable of making it to the other side. However, there is this other voice that refuses to give up and if given the chance, it will become a deafening roar that pushes me to my limits and lets me know that there is strength, unbeatable strength within and all I need to do is stand back up and start moving. Just remember that it will get worse before it gets better it says and that is the truth.

It takes time, it takes effort and it takes hard work to get to the top of the mountain and there will be times when I will take a fall and land where I don’t want to be, lost in my own excuses of why I can’t move on. Acknowledge but don’t get too comfortable where you are. It is no man’s land and you want better so stand back up and look towards that open door and go through it because failure is not an option.

“Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says I’ll try again tomorrow.” Mary Ann Radmacher

Also remember that failure is a choice, standing still is not an option and walking away from things that keep you from achieving your goals is the right thing to do no matter how painful it is. Let go of things that don’t serve you and make the commitment to keep going and you will arrive at where you need to be. My mission for this week is to keep moving, one step at a time and to keep going.

“No matter how bad things are right now.

No matter how stuck you feel,

No matter how many days you’ve spent wishing things were different,

No matter how hopeless and depressed you feel,

I promise you won’t feel this way forever.” Unknown

Here’s a story of hope. Last year, I uprooted a peony bush because it was growing too close to a fence and its growth was being stunted. I decided to move it to a smaller area where I thought it would thrive. There was a risk that it might not survive the process at all. All through winter, it looked like it had died. A week ago, I noticed that it was sprouting! Today, when I walked out the front door I noticed that new leaves were forming and it was budding and there were five buds on this tiny plant. Perhaps, it is a lesson from nature that even in the deepest darkest of times when we think all is lost, life is working its magic to show us that patience wins out and “better” is on its way. If all else fails, remember that it is not Amazon Prime, the delivery doesn’t happen in one or two days!

IT TAKES TIME.

Mistakes

“You can pickup a mistake and carry it as a burden, or you can set it down and use it as a stepping stone to greatness.” Unknown

It has been said that a mistake is usually “an action, decision, or judgement that produces an unwanted or unintentional results.” Quite often than not, the unintentional results can be painful, it makes us doubt ourselves and our judgement of others. It also means that the outcome did not meet our expectations. Therefore, it was time wasted or more appropriately it was an investment that did not put forth what it was meant to do.

There are different kinds of mistakes. It can be related to cheating on a partner, allowing people to push you around, dating or marrying the wrong person, refusing to listen to good advice or quite simply a frivolous disregard to what is staring you in the face. It’s there as plain as day, it is clear that it’s a mistake to carry on and yet because of the time and energy spent in chasing that dream, whatever it maybe for you, we refuse to call it quits and move on. We refuse to accept it as a lesson learned or as a stepping stone to something better.

“A mistake that keeps being repeated is not a mistake, it’s a choice.” Unknown

Just like it is in Groundhog’s Day, we see a “series of unwelcome or tedious events appear to be recurring in exactly the same way,” and this is not only boring and irritating but it’s time to get off that emotional roller coaster and head for greener pastures. The choices we make are hard at times. I know that quite often I am stuck on redial. I know that I should hang up and start anew but the human side or rather the foolish side wants to hang on for just a while longer knowing full well that I should count it as a lost cause, sunken cost as they say in business, take the lesson learned with me and make the decision to not do it ever again. Sunk costs basically means “that costs have been incurred by past actions and they cannot be recovered and they are not relevant to our future decisions,” and yet we choose to repeat it over and over again. I am human, I say, but that is putting it mildly!

Perhaps, it would be easier if we can forget the mistakes but remember the lessons we’ve learned from our walks into the big wide world of MISTAKES LAND and believe me it is a jungle out there. We’ve all made them, we’ll continue to make them and more likely than not we’ll rush in with our eyes wide open BUT it is the picking up, dusting off and the moving on bit that matters here. Here’s to mistakes both big and small. Bring them on!

“When you make a mistake, there are only three things you should ever do about it: admit it, learn from it, and don’t repeat it.” Paul Bear Bryant

From your lips to God’s ears!

An Amazing Day!

“Everyday is a new beginning. Treat it that way. Stay away from what might have been and move on. Don’t let negative words or actions of others affect your smile. Decide that today is a good day.” Unknown

I’ve decided that it’s going to be an amazing day! Once I get out of bed that is. The covers keep my feet warm and the dark room offers comfort. I can stay here forever if I let myself but I’ve got “miles to go before I sleep.” The poet, Robert Frost, is talking about having much to do before death comes calling but I’ll keep it on a lighter note. I’ve got lots to do before I can put my feet up again but the biggest thing on my mind is to have an amazing day.

It’s all about the mindset folks. Mindset is defined as, “a habitual or characteristic mental attitude that determines how you will interpret and respond to situations.” I’m bent on having an amazing day today so here we go!

It will be an amazing day because I won’t sweat the small stuff. Whatever comes my way to kick me off my pedestal of entertaining only good thoughts will be met with “ignore and let go.”

It will be an amazing day because I will be good to myself. I will lose myself in nature to clear my mind and enjoy the thousand miracles it offers. While I’m out there I will take as many deep breaths as I can so that by the time I get back home, I will be floating on air!

It will be an amazing day because I’m going to find a quiet spot and proceed to shut the world out. It’s my time and I will do what I want to. I will close my eyes, tune out the noise and go within and repeat the mystical sacred mantra OM for as many times as needed. I will stay there for awhile and then emerge a brand new person having ostracized all the bad stuff, just like a butterfly that emerges from the cocoon and sees the world for the first time.

It will be an amazing day because I will actively work to shut out negativity. I will also shut out negative people those whose only preoccupation with life is to bring people down with their words and deeds. Today that’s a no go and ignore and close the door will be my response. If need be, I will do a cleansing ritual, just kidding. I will bolster up the positive aspects of my life and hope it will be enough to keep negativity away. Fingers crossed or I will need to do more OMs to keep it at bay.

It will be an amazing day because I’m going to enjoy my own company. I will pamper myself, eat nutritious foods, nurture the inner child and open my eyes to miracles around me. Ones I don’t see caught up in the day to day cycle of this thing called life. I will see me for who I am and I will know that I am enough as I am.

“Another day starts. Let the adventure begin. Good morning, have a great day.”

Go out and have an AMAZING DAY!

Yesterday

Someone once said, you are NOT yesterday. True but the stories we tell ourselves, the narratives that we trap ourselves in sometimes tell us that we are. Yesterday does carry some weight because it helps to define who we are today. The memories of yesterday can mold or break us, it can teach us not to do the same things over and over again and more often than not, it gives us the strength to carry on. The truth of the matter is that we cannot rewrite history and we cannot go back and change the outcome of a story that happened and is now done with. Yesterday is just that, it was and is a part of our past and except for the revisits from time to time of well-kept memories, it is nothing more than that. It is a story that is finished, it has taken its final bow or curtain call and so must we by letting it go.

This is what I tell myself on the journey I am on. I can’t keep carrying yesterday on my back or like an albatross around my neck. The load is heavy and it makes me want to stop, turn around and run back to what was familiar even if that familiarity has the power to hurt like hell. The unknown before me is terrifying and anything is better than this right? What’s before is shrouded in fog, it is dark and foreboding and forging through it takes superhuman effort but the small negative voice within me which at times roars like a waterfall tells me that I can’t do it! Take small steps, one step at a time, you don’t have to know everything, just trust and you will get there says this other shaky voice but there are no other options, moving forward is where I need to go.

Sometimes it is the boundaries we place around ourselves that trap us, that tell us that the imaginary world we live in is so much better than what is waiting out there. Sure it was painful but there was greatness too. It was filled with things I knew and cherished, in one word, it is irreplaceable. The stories we tell ourselves are the fences we place around us. Was yesterday that great? Did we embellish it like a Christmas tree to make it sparkle and shine when the reality is a different story? Do the stories we tell ourselves distort reality and yet it is the truth as we see it or is it because we want to see it that way?

Harold R. Johnson said, “We are all story. We are the stories we are told and we are the stories we tell ourselves. To change our circumstances, we need to change our story: edit it, modify it, or completely rewrite it.”

I don’t want to completely rewrite my past. I want to take the good parts with me, the bad parts I want to thank for teaching me lessons I would not have learned otherwise and the pain? Well, I want to leave that behind where it belongs. Enough tears have been shed, enough wishing that it could have been different has not made it less so and closing the door behind me and moving on is the way to go. The next chapter is waiting and yesterday is done with.

“Forget yesterday – it has already forgotten you. Don’t sweat tomorrow – you haven’t even met. Instead, open your eyes and heart to a truly precious gift – today.” Steve Maraboli

Here’s to yesterday. You taught me lessons I didn’t want to learn but had to accept. You gave me memories I will forever treasure. You made me who I am today and for that I will forever be thankful.

Today is a blank slate.

Into the Unknown

I opened my mailbox this morning and there was this message from my son. It said, “Mom, I am really stressed about all this job stuff and etc.” Basically, he was saying, he was afraid of the path looming before him. The path we have all been on when school comes to an end and it is time to pick up the reins of your own life. This unknown path is wrought with stumbling blocks, disappointments, fear and unseen monsters both big and small and he will have to do battle to get to where he wants to go and that is hard for a young man to understand. Success will be waiting but only if he puts in the hard work. He will be stepping into the real world.

While sipping my coffee, I wondered how I should respond. Oh yes, he knows that I love him and that I am there for him and will be there every step of the way because I am his biggest fan but knowing that is still not going to make it easy for him. He is on his own as far as getting on the path and putting one foot in front of the other. There will be disappointments in the form of rejections which will make him want to question his self-worth and times when he will want to throw up his hands and give up. It is all part and parcel of the journey he will have to take. So what do you tell a young man who is looking back at yesterday when life was made easy for him.

I was there when he woke up crying because he was afraid of the boogeyman. I was there when he got his first bloody knee and putting a bandaid made it all alright again. I was there when he needed picking up in the early morning hours after a late night party. I was there for all of life’s big and small events and when a bandaid and being there made it all ok. So here we are in the here and now.

I knew that the leap into the unknown would be his alone. He had training wheels on yesterday but today and in the here and now, he HAS TO GO IT ALONE. I will still be there in the shadows cheering him on and I will always be his biggest fan as I have always been. I will be standing at the finish line waving him on but he has to take this journey alone. I hope the lessons he has learned along the way will push him towards the end goal. Getting a job, standing on his own two feet and taking responsibility for his life is just the beginning, the very beginning of this journey called life.

So I wrote back giving him advice on how to navigate life. Life lessons from my own experiences added to the message but it was clear, he had no choice. He had to get on the path and get moving. ”Do the work, the hard work and YOU WILL GET THERE!”

Bandaids are a thing of the past. Holding his hand is too but being a parent never ends and as he stares into the unknown, I will be there every step of the way cheering him on and that my dear son is the bandaid in another form.

“As you move outside of your comfort zone, what was once the unknown and frightening becomes your new normal.” Robin S. Sharuna