To be honest, I struggled with today's post. It feels like a continuation of last week's post, and I don't want to be redundant. Also, it's the first post of a new year, and I really wanted to give you something that would encourage, inspire, and uplift you, something of real value.
The thing is, I realize New Years can be like a stretch of beautiful, inviting countryside calling to us to come partake of its sweet pleasures…countryside possibly riddled with dangerous landmines. Nice visual, I know. And I don't want to ruin anything for you if you're a person who loves the new-beginning, blank-page, full-of-hope-for-better-things aspect of the changing of the year.
I'm a firm believer in the power of hope. It can be inspiring and motivating to make plans for this being the year we will ________ (fill in the blank). But it can also be discouraging.
Why?
- If we've made big plans in the past and then not followed through, we can experience self-doubt in our ability to improve and worry about what will happen to our self-esteem if we "fail" yet again.
- If we've accomplished our goals and then felt a bit of a let-down instead of the sense of accomplishment we expected, we can start to wonder if the goals we set are worth the effort.
- If it seems everyone else in the world is happily making resolutions and we have no desire to do that, we may feel like we're lazy or there's something wrong with us.
- If we become so focused on our goals and intoxicated by our progress toward them that we forget the people in our lives are more important than our to-do list, we can feel out of balance and not understand why.
- We can get so wrapped up in doing that we forget what's more important is being.
Goal setting/resolution making can be a powerful tool in self-improvement. It can be a crucial component of creating a life that's meaningful and satisfying to us. Let me be clear that I'm a huge advocate of living an intentional life, and setting goals can have an essential role in that.
But…
Goal setting/resolution making can also become a dangerous distraction from what our real intent for our life is. How? It can feed into a false sense that if we accomplish everything, or even most, of what we set out to do, then we will automatically have a happy life. This is not the way to happiness. Most of us probably know someone we consider very accomplished who isn't all that happy.
Of course, what we do matters, but it's not all that matters. And, I believe, it's not even what matters most. The thing we have control over that matters most is who we are and how we are.
I guess what I'm trying to say is this – give yourself permission to simply be you and to do whatever Life is calling to you to do right now.
- If setting precise goals with a specific timetable for accomplishing them helps you be the best you, go for it!
- If focusing on a bigger picture, a more general sense of how you want to evolve feels right, you hold onto that big picture and trust yourself to head that direction without setting up a specific plan for how to get there.
- If you're at a point in life where the thing that would feed your soul the most is merely sitting with how things are and allowing yourself time to observe and assimilate what's happening in your life or what you've recently gone through, then, by all means,
sit for a while.
Trust yourself and trust Life. It's all good.
Wherever you are in life – be there!