It seems the measure of success has shifted or maybe we have added another criteria to the definition of success.
Success in our society (North America) is measured by money and power, from what I see, we also measure our success by how busy we are.
It starts by trying to accomplish as much as you can, keeping yourself moving from one task to the next. We even start our children down this busy schedule plan by bringing them from one activity to the next.( Soccer, swimming music lessons,hockey ).I think we have been duped into believing more must be better.
If I am really busy, my family is busy every night, we have commitments every weekend then we must be accomplishing something , I must be doing the right thing??
Maybe, but I feel at some point we start losing the battle,our ability to put quality into everything we do starts to diminish. It is very easy for my life to become a numbers game. A giant “to do” list. Full of deadlines and tasks and too many goals. Even if my goals are with the right intent to better my world, my family, my community, I feel too much can have the opposite effect.
I start to compromise the quality that goes into each goal, task, word and thought. Time is not flexible, I cannot change time. I can only change what is a priority in my life and if I want the most out of my priorities I need to assess the amount of time each priority requires to be absolute in my efforts. If being a person of substance and depth is a priority for myself everything I do must have quality to it. No more ridiculous lists. I have to change them into realistic, obtainable priorities, some of which will take a lifetime to see through but I think I am OK with that.
I was reading an article, the author( Leo Babauta) put forward a thought which made me stop and think. He wrote something to this effect “…what if we truly believed our lives were perfect, no need to lose weight, no need for bigger muscles, no need to run faster, look prettier, no need for a bigger house, car, no need for more stuff and merchandise…life was perfect. If we could for a moment enjoy what we were and what we had the stress of trying to do more would disappear, we could just enjoy the “right now” and peace would at last be ours. We could spend more time helping others instead of trying to make ourselves better. If we decided to accomplish something more it would only be a bonus to our already perfect lives…we were good enough right now…”
Interesting, the author was trying to put forward the concept of quality in your life and the ability to enjoy the present as opposed to always focusing on what you have to do next. I think a person needs to stop living to serve the goals but have the goals serve the person.
JC Msterson, Silent River Kung Fu, Alberta, Canada
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1 comment:
excellent blog, I agree whole-heartedly.
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