On guiding your destiny…
"You are what you do, not what you say you'll do."
~ Carl Jung
“Our worth is measured by what we devote our energy to.”
~ Marcus
“Your beliefs become your thoughts
Your thoughts become your words
Your words become your actions
Your actions become your habits
Your habits become your values
Your values become your destiny”
~ Mahatma Ghandi
“The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.”
~ Emerson
Be intentional about your thoughts and the reality you’re creating.
Whatever you pay attention to will grow within you….good and bad.
“How do I know the difference between mind chatter (ego) and the quiet voice within? What part of me do I trust?”
Ram Dass: People who are very enamored with their intellect don’t trust that inner space.
They don’t know how to tune to it. They just haven’t noticed its existence, because they were so busy thinking about everything.
There’s very little you can say to somebody who’s going through that because it isn’t real to them. It doesn’t exist. You can remind them of moments they’ve been out of their mind, because once you have acknowledged the existence of that other plane of reality, in which you know that wisdom exists, then immediately all the moments when you had it in life, that you treated as irrelevant or as error, or as, “I was out of my mind,” suddenly become real to you, and you start to trust that dimension more.
But what happens is the minute you’re in an anxious moment, you go into your mind and try to think your way out of it again. Then you just feel the harshness of it, while the intuitive wisdom has a kind of flow with things. It has a soft way of being in the universe, not a harshness. Even a firmness is soft. Yeah, it’s a tricky one to talk about...
Is this a conflict with determinism? No it fits perfectly. Forces outside your control are guiding you to make the decision to act or not. It’s just an illusion to you. So if you are going to be a lazy slob or not…is preordained, but still up to you. Is this a paradox or a dichotomy?…not IF you unpack it enough. Think about it some more.
This applies to things in your control and things somewhat in your control…not to things out of your control…the trichotomy of control. (see explanation by Irvine in the A Guide to the Good Life.
The very first paragraph says that animals (in the Stoic view) have their judgements and preferences hardwired in, and they just do what they do. Our possession of a facility (reason) than can contemplate itself, as well as contemplate the outside world, is our superpower. It makes us distinctly human, it is the divine part of us, a gift from the gods of their own stuff.
We can reason about how we reason, and form preferences about our preferences, and chose our choices! We can make ourselves. This is a huge deal. This is the whole reason why Stoic practice exists.
“First say to yourself what you would be;
and then do what you have to do.”
~ Epictetus
If you have it is a new activity and/or you are nervous…just play a role. Act out who you want you portray. Put on a different persona. Fake it until you make it.
We are what our choices make us. Do we walk the fifteen minutes to work, or do we take an Uber? Hit the snooze button, or get up early? Do we have the difficult conversation, or hide from it? Is good enough really good enough?
What you put out is what you get back.
What goes around comes around.
What doesn't transmit light creates its own darkness.
"The world will ask you who you are, and if you do not know, the world will tell you."
~ Carl Jung
How much longer are you going to wait to demand the best of and for yourself?
Because life is short. The time is now. And gains are cumulative.
"The twisted tree lives its life, while the right tree ends up in planks.”
~ Chinese proverb
The tree (person) that grows straight (the right tree) - conforms to rules and normal expectations - doesn't get to live a life completely free to pursue its own passions but instead is used by the type of people/business/life that it tried to conform to. Meanwhile, the twisted tree made no efforts to live under strict expectation and pursued a life that took it in many different directions - but made these changes and choices by its own free will and thus lived a more satisfying life.
This is your life and you’re writing your story. Don't ever let someone else hold the pen.
Take the path less taken.
“If you really want something and you believe you can have it, things start weirdly shifting so that you end up more likely to get it.”
~ Ed Stafford, bloke that walked the Amazon river
Watch your thoughts, they become words.
Watch your words, they become actions.
Watch your actions, they become habits.
Watch your habits, they become character.
Character is who you are and helps determine your path in life.
Watch yourself, you make your own destiny.
20 second rule
Be brave for 20 seconds. You can do anything for 20 seconds. What’s the worst that can happen? You are back where you were with more knowledge?
You miss 100% of the shots you don't take.
Goals for the future are important as long as we remember that it’s not about the goal, it’s about the process. Learn to enjoy the process. The goal is just there to define the process. Once the goal is reached define a new one and enjoy this process as well. Some goals, the most important, we may never reach and that’s OK. In fact it’s awesome. It is the journey I must remember to enjoy, not the destination. That is what life is about. Learn to enjoy the journey and the rest will all fall into place. That is the nature of the Tao.
“There is no path to happiness. Happiness is the path.”
~ Buddha
"I made a point of reading the referee's handbook. One of the rules I gleaned from it was that each referee has a designated slot where he is supposed to be on the floor. If the ball, for instance, is in place W, referees X, Y, and Z each have an area on the court assigned to them.
“When they do that, it creates dead zones, areas on the floor where they can't see certain things. I learned where those zones were, and I took advantage of them. I would get away with holds, travels, and all sorts of minor violations simply because I took the time to understand the officials' limitations."
~ Kobe Bryant
“Most geniuses—especially those who lead others—prosper not by deconstructing intricate complexities but by exploiting unrecognized simplicities.”
~ Andy Benoit
"Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. "
~ Leo Tolstoy