What if we are meant to play small? I know that isn’t the common theme, especially in the Western
world where Self-Help books are bestsellers. We are supposed to flourish and become all that we can
be. In fact, if we are anything less than an absolute success in America, it’s our own damn fault.
My childhood was a good one. It had its faults and its blessings. But overall the message I received from
my parents, teachers, and society was: You can do anything you put your mind to.
And this is true. It is a solid message to give to children.
However, there is a two part caveat:
1. All things come in their own time.
2. You still must be satisfied with what you have now.
Perhaps this isn’t true for everyone. I see a lot of executives that refuse to be satisfied with their results.
They want bigger, better, grander. They have a lot. But they want more. Always, more. They get more
and they aren’t satisfied. What good is more if you can’t appreciate it? How can you appreciate more if
you don’t know how to appreciate enough?
I don’t want to live that way. I would love my life to stand for something. I want to play a big part.
Desperately. I’d also prefer that big part to include financial security and abundance. That’s my own
personal request to the universe.
But no longer will I let this wish (which in reality could be a fairy tale) stand between me and happiness.
When you’re told that success is all up to you and you do everything you can, yet meet with opposition
it makes you want to sit back and take stock of the situation. It’s easy to become disenchanted. To
want to give up.
But there is another way. If #1 above never happens, you must find a way to have #2.
I want to be happy now. And sometimes happiness is found in settling for what you’ve got. Being
grateful, even.
I mean….bottom line, in America (for the most part), we are blessed. We have enough. Commercialism
and materialism and capitalism…they don’t want you to settle. Their profits are driven by your
restlessness and constant search for your own personal El Dorado.
What if El Dorado, Utopia, Life As We Want It, never happens? Will this all be a waste because you
never appreciated what you had?
Or, like me, are you going to look back at the hard times and wished you had appreciated the good you
had? I’ve struggled with money so much that I didn’t see the other abundance. It’s hard to appreciate
the house when you’re struggling to pay the mortgage once every two months. Just like a newborn ceases it’s adorable-ness when he/she is screaming his/her head off for the third straight hour in the
middle of the night and you just want to simply sleep, we forget what good we have in our very arms
when we only hear and see (pay attention to) the screaming. There is joy in today. I want to see it and embrace it before it’s too late. I have to accept that at same
point, I may not achieve what I want.
Because what’s the alternative? I do get it but at the sacrifice of every living moment until then? I have
to be able to enjoy now, even as strive for tomorrow.
I’ve written before about how to manifest and it always seems to be that when you let go of what you
want, that desperate death grip you have on it. When you lower your bar to what is already here in
your life and stop aiming for those stars but instead appreciate the flowers at your feet, something
magical happens. You become happy, now.
It’s a paradox that in order to be happy you need both to accept the now and strive for the future. They
are not mutually exclusive. And it is confusing at times. It’s hard to encompass these dual states.
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