Originally posted on Facebook HERE
This is the 155th time I’ve sat in my living room, taken the photo from our back window and started writing. Next week when I hit #156 will make three years worth of posts, and the third edition of the “Looking Out My Back Window” series of blogs will be coming out in book form in a month or so. That’s just crazy to me. I try to remember when/how I wrote the first post, and if I had any idea I’d actually keep it going at all. I just went back and read post #1 – from July 4th, 2017. No idea. No indication in that post that I was doing anything other than a regular Facebook post. And three years later I’ve published four books, with a fifth on the way. Sometimes we set a goal, and work hard at attaining it – and sometimes the goal finds us. I actually tried blogging long before I started the “LOMBW” series – quite unsuccessfully. Several times. Didn’t stick with it, didn’t like what I wrote, tried all kinds of things to force myself to write (at one time I started a website called thedailyten.net to write for ten minutes a day and publish whatever came out. Lasted maybe a week). And then, one day back in 2017 it all came together when I wasn’t even trying. And it continues to this day. We have a tendency to set goals and try to accomplish them by forcing them to adapt to our will about how to achieve them. Maybe it’s better to set a goal, to visualize it and surrender the “how” to a power greater than ourselves. And, in the meantime – be open to the Universe presenting us with opportunities we never even knew existed. Because sometimes they just come at us from life itself and take us in a wild, new direction we never expected. And often that’s really where the magic is. Stay open to new ideas – and years later, when someone asks you “how did you ever get started doing this?”, you’ll look back like I am today and not really know how to answer that – it was just something that life itself pulled you into. It’s an amazing ride. Opportunities are everywhere. Sometimes we need to just say say yes when we’re presented one, and see where it takes us – especially if our ego starts to freak out with all the reasons it won’t work, or is a bad idea. Get calm. What does your heart say? Question everything, always. Try new things. Don’t get me wrong, I love routine – but small changes in routine can make big changes in life. So stay open. Get started. Some opportunities are hidden within others. So, you start something and realize it’s totally not anything you’re interested in at all, but because you started it you met someone, or went somewhere, or read something that leads you into another opportunity that changes everything. Surrender to what is right there in front of you. Give up the need for control once in a while, and just let life happen. And try to enjoy it all, wherever it takes you.
