Ready When YOU Are!
“When the student is ready,
the teacher will appear.” -Laozi
There are few truths more certain than the old definition of insanity as, “Doing the same thing over and over again but expecting a different result!” Yet, every year–hundreds of new $30 books penned by “experts” seeking to provide us the means of change, are rolled out across our culture and society as the magic pill or secret potion to all that ails us–and there is a LOT that ails us.
Yet, despite spending billions on millions of books that will soon be gathering dust next to all of the other “How-To” books we purchased, we are MORE drug addicted, divorced, phobic, over-weight, under-performing, and unhappy than ever before. Added to these dusty libraries of stagnant advice are the thousands of Tony Robbins-like self-help gurus promising to transform our lives for just eight hours of our time and a few thousand in fees.
Seriously, has there ever been more of an imbalance in money and time spent and results achieved? This is the human equivalent of trying to jump-start a dead battery. It fires up for the moment-but soon reverts to its former state of low or no energy. The jump is a transaction-not an investment.
Here’s the dirty little secret to life-changing evolution. It never happens…until you’re internally ready to pull the trigger! At some point in time (or not) you’ll reach a “tipping point” in your life where the status quo simply becomes intolerable and those ever-elusive changes become mandatory.
At this point in time, the books and teachers serve a legitimate purpose–to coach and assist the facilitation of your directional changes. They’re rarely the catalyst to change but can certainly provide the tailwinds of momentum and expertise to change-in-progress. It’s not a coach’s job to drag you out of bed to practice–but once on the field, they are invaluable sources of motivation and knowledge.
Myself included, the biggest mistake too many people make is expecting the “spark” to come from anyplace but inside themselves. Again, there is no external catalyst that will succeed in driving change from an unwilling or uncommitted spirit. Like the dead battery example, an un-committed spirit is incapable of leveraging positive external forces-no matter HOW powerful.
“To begin is the most important part of any quest
and by far the most courageous.” – Plato
The reasons for lack of motivation and ability to alter the course of one’s life are almost infinite and fill as many volumes of books as do the self-help books. I’m not a psychologist but at the end of the day, there is one undeniable axiom that simply cannot be ignored. We always have it within us to change direction and pivot into a new journey and course of action with each new sunrise. We have that freedom and the one similarity we all share is that we all will face a litany of obstacles, challenges and impediments standing in the way of our happiness and success.
It’s how we choose to acknowledge and deal with these roadblocks that will determine our outcome. Nothing else. We all came into this world alone and we’re all leaving the same way. In between, our lives are little more than the sum total of the choices we’ve made.
I have become a huge fan of Brene Brown’s books on what constitutes a healthy spirit and soul. One of the key takeaways of her work is the power (and necessity) of self-forgiveness. There’s things that we’ve all done that give us pause, that can be paralyzing if not cut free and moved beyond. Too many lives have been sacrificed on the altar of what cannot be changed or undone.
Again, our mistakes and misjudgments can be the sack of stones that carry us to the bottom of the lake, or the foundational steps of new (and better) beginnings. I think the most powerful premise we can all embrace is this. If we don’t take ownership of our lives, we’re simply the subject of the story…not the author. By taking responsibility for and owning every aspect of our lives, we earn the right to compose what chapters remain. In life, there is no greater power than ownership of that pen.
Never underestimate the power you have
to take your life in a new direction. –Germany Kent
