The Most Important Promise You Can Make

15 Oct 2009

So your business isn’t working for you. Hell, maybe your life isn’t working for you. Maybe it’s your job…you hate it. It sucks the life out of you and you feel like you don’t have time for anything else. You wake up every morning, thrilled at the prospect of achievement and yet when you get home at 5 or 6, maybe later, every day…there’s nothing left.

Maybe it’s your relationship. Your wife doesn’t understand you. Your family doesn’t believe in you. Your boyfriend isn’t the same anymore. You don’t feel happy inside.

It could be your business. It isn’t thriving…no matter what you do to inject some life into it, you can’t make any headway. It just seems like no matter what you do, no matter how hard you try, you are destined to fail.

Step 1: Awareness

I’ve been here, and it isn’t pretty. When I race in a triathlon, there are periods of open road, particularly on the 56 miles of the bike leg, where I feel lonelier than I’ve ever been. When things aren’t working, and you feel alone, you start to attack yourself with thoughts and pretty soon, your judgment is impaired. The first thing you need to realize is that this feeling will pass. Whether in a matter of minutes, hours, days, or years, you will get through the pain you are feeling right now. Just as the good never lasts, neither does the bad. That’s the simplicity and the beauty of Zen, and one of the reasons why I’ve been able to get through the hardest parts of my journey. When our times are desperate, our minds will do us more harm than good. So first…stop beating yourself up. Recognize the pain for what it is and know that it will pass. This isn’t the truth.

It’s just like when you wake up in the morning and you feel like you’ve done something wrong or forgot something important. As your day continues, the feeling fades, but early on, when you are just coming out of your dream state, the filter that protects you from irrational thought is gone, leaving you with a mind wide open…too open. Although in time you’ll learn that this is a great place from which to meditate and channel your deepest true self, it takes time before that can happen. The first step is simply to acknowledge the emotion and realize that it will pass.

Step 2: Analysis

Now, there are two reasons why your life isn’t what you wanted it to be.

1. You aren’t following your path

2. You aren’t patient enough

I know what you’re thinking…it can’t be true. What if I need to try harder or make greater sacrifices? What if I’m destined to be a failure? Maybe it’s selfish to ask to be happy. Again…stop.

Follow Your Path

Let’s talk about the first option to see if it fits you. You’ll know that you aren’t following your path when you feel disconnected from your life. If you have to tune part of yourself out, at any moment during the day, then you aren’t living the life you were destined to live. If you are not 100% happy, then you aren’t doing what you love, and that is a problem.

If you try to force your way down a path that is not your own, you will feel displaced. You won’t be all in, and you’ll feel like there’s something missing. There is a difference between following your path and being rich or having achieved all of your goals. Not living your destiny means that your goals are out of sync with your true self or that you are allowing yourself to give in to social pressure. Remember, there is no one that can tell you how to live, so if you have to give up your job and move to Europe in order to live your destiny, then you need to start planning it…today.

You’ll know you are living your purpose when you can’t wait to wake up in the morning and have to be dragged into bed at night. Your life will feel full of purpose and you won’t feel like you’re working, even if you might be. During this time, you’ll feel an initial phase of excitement, followed by a period of burnout, but that’s normal. However, you can use that feeling as a barometer to how closely you are living your purpose. If you find yourself feeling unhappy or lost, then you need to stop, re-evaluate your path, and then continue moving forward. It is the same principal that we Army Soldiers apply during land navigation exercises, the only difference is the measurement tool used to gauge your direction. In our case it is a magnetic compass, in yours it is an emotional compass.

Once you’ve started on to the path of destiny, and you feel it with every fiber of your being, then you can move on to the 2nd phase of troubleshooting, which is patience.

Patience

Living your destiny doesn’t mean that you’ve accomplished all of your goals. It doesn’t even mean that you will. It does mean, however, that you are on the way to accomplishing the goals that have been laid out before you. Call it destiny, call it God, call it the Tao, call it whatever you wish, but the longer I live the more I realize that there’s something out there that knows how to plan my life better than I do.

Have you ever noticed that sometimes you reach a goal and it doesn’t feel like you thought it would? On the other hand, there are times when you reached a state of well being that had nothing to do with any of the plans you had laid out for yourself. We’re talking Zen again, or as some might say, the middle way (Tao te Ching). The essence of being at peace with your life is not expecting a result, but experiencing the path as it unfolds.

I know it sounds contrived, but if you realize that at some point, all things will end and eventually there will be a day in which the task list is left incomplete and goals are left unachieved, then you can sit back and examine your life for what it is…a progression from birth to death, during which you get to touch others, reach out through the passion that ignites your work, and be at peace with yourself. The trick is the last portion of that phrase.

I know you want to be rich or travel the world, and it will happen if you are patient and allow your path to unfold before you. Forcing the issue, which is something I often struggle with, will cause you more pain and heartache than is worthwhile. Therefore, as Dr. Seuss said, “Don’t cry because it is over, smile because it happened.” That’s the essence of what this essay is about and realizing that none of us are incapable of being happy is one of the most important leaps of faith you might ever take.

We may not be perfect according to those around us, but we’re all perfect in our own right. Celebrate what makes you you and promise yourself that you’ll live it every day. The most important promise that you can make, is the one you make to yourself. There are no gatekeepers that can hold you back…there’s only you.