It’s funny how many times I’ll find myself saying “Don’t do what I did, do what I say.” I laugh as I say it because I have at times been the poster child for doing things exactly the wrong way. I’m intimate with the phrase, “I’m ok! I meant to do that!” Yeah, shake it off and keep going, that’s me. This usually breaks the ice and people feel comfortable to admit that they don’t know how to get started for themselves. Which is ironic since most of them have helped numbers of people they know get started and keep on course to build their business/best life/family etc. This isn’t a failing, just a part of life. We can’t see our own back without a mirror. We can’t see the back of our own head because our eyes aren’t on stalks that can give us the angle. We need someone else to peek around and make sure everything is the way it should be or give us guidance to get it there.
Where that whole irony thing comes in is most people who are stuck not knowing what to do first, how to get started, or where they should head actually do know these things, in theory. They help others with them all the time. They have supported their friends, family, extended family, church group, organization and book club members get through it. They can see the issue a mile away and give just the right amount of support or encouragement or noodge to get that person on their way. They have all the knowing, but not the experience in doing. Or in other words, they have the tools but don’t know how to apply them. Because explaining it to someone else is very different from doing it yourself. Doing opens up who new aspects of our lives, forces us to recognize how interconnected everything is, and highlights what routine can keep hidden from us, every action we take creates and changes the world. It may seem routine, it may seem like we are on a hamster wheel, but that wheel is making sound, moving air, accumulating oils and wearing out parts. The movement is putting particles into the atmosphere. We are impacting the world whether we are choosing to do so passively through routine or through enacting our heart’s desires.
So what to do? Well, the first step actually is the easiest and yet the hardest. Commit. We do it every day. We commit to going to work, to doing the errands, to eating lunch, to sending that text, to meeting up with friends or colleagues after work, you name it. We commit to putting gas in the car whether it wants more or not! And we follow through on those commitments. Just look at all you’ve done today and you’ll see how committed you’ve been and how amazingly successful. Stop looking at the rest of the “To Do List” that you haven’t gotten done. You know that list is self-abuse to begin with. There was no way you’d get it all done and you knew that when you wrote it so stop kidding yourself, stop abusing yourself and pay attention…ahem…where was I? Oh yeah. So if you can commit to all of that, then you can commit to that thing you know will make you happy, will make your life better, and will make life the place you want to be. It’s easy to do, you do that kind of thing all the time. It’s hard, though, because you know in doing it that everything changes. Why? You know because you’ve helped others do it. But that’s where it starts. By claiming that this is now part of your life. That you are this thing and no longer the person waiting for some sign that you should start being this thing. Once you commit, then the practical aspects start to unfold on their own, because you already know what to do. It’s about applying them to yourself. You ready?